2015 Half Ton Classics Cup - Day 3

by Fiona Brown on 20 Aug 2015 The sun finally shone on the Half Ton Classics Cup fleet on the third day of the regatta, which also brought more moderate wind and sea conditions. The crews enjoyed a fabulous day of classic champagne sailing to complete races six and seven of their series.

Both races were run on three lap windward/leeward courses which gave the boats some terrific racing, but still enabled them to be back on the dock by early afternoon for some well deserved relaxation time at the Koninklijke Yacht Club Nieuwpoort.

The lighter conditions saw some new faces making it to the front of the fleet and the day's top performer was Robbie Tregear's beautiful baby blue Per Elisa, the last custom Half Tonner ever built - in 1992 to a Ceccarelli design - which finished second in the Half Ton Cup of that same year. Per Elisa has raced in all the revival Half Ton Classics Cups and with a second and first place today Robbie and his crew made it clear that they hope to improve on their previous best result, which was a third in 2009, the last time the event was held in Nieuwpoort.

In the first race of the day overnight leader Checkmate XV, owned by Ireland's David Cullen, sailed a text book race to win by 68 seconds. Per Elisa had led the race early on but couldn't hold off Checkmate's onslought so had to be content with second. Happy to be back racing in more moderate conditions, Johny Swan's Harmony took third with Jeremy Florizoone's Alf fourth.

Race seven saw both Per Elisa and Checkmate XV down at the pin end which Checkmate technically won, however Per Elisa came off the line slightly to weather and with fantastic pace and stormed her way up the first beat, never missing a shift. By the first mark she already had a confident lead and she continued to build on that throughout the race, eventually winning by an impressive six minutes 47 seconds.

Whilst Per Elisa was out on her own, the chasing pack fought an incredible battle for second. Initially Checkmate had looked good for it, but mainsheet man John Murphy got a little overenthusiastic on the second run and the jury penalised them for pumping. The resulting penalty lost them three places on the water, but they sailed their socks off to catch back up. On corrected time with only 38 seconds between second and fifith on corrected time only 38 seconds separated second to fifth and it was Paul Pullen's Miss Whiplash who took second by a mere three seconds from Checkmate XV with the Spilleboudt brothers' Blue Berry Pi in fourth and Harmony fifth.

In the overall standings the completion of race seven means that the boats are now allowed two discards. With their worst result a third place David Cullen and his boys from Howth aboard Checkmate XV lead the regatta with 7.1 points. Paul Pullen's Cornishmen in Miss Whiplash are now in second with 13.6 points and Robby Tregear and Per Elisa jump from tenth into third with 22 points. The Spilleboudt's Blue Berry Pi has moved from seventh to fourth on 24.9 points.

Tomorrow the race committee intends to run the long coastal race, which carries a scoring coefficient of 1.5 and cannot be discarded. The forecast is for the grey skies and rain showers to return and for the wind to be southerly, but somewhat shifty and squally as the showers come through.

Results:

Position     Boat	Sailnumber	Name		Club	TCC	R1     R2     R3   R4   R5     R6    R7 Total
mate XV	IRL 2016	David Cullen		Howth Yacht Club	0,944	1	1,1	2	2	3,3	1	3	7,1
2 Miss Whiplash	GBR  5435	Paul Pullen		RCYC	0,945	2	4,4	6	3	2,2	5	2	13,6
3 Per Elisa	GBR 2759 R	Robby Tregear			0,960	6	26,4	7	6	9,9	2	1	22
4 Blue Berret pi	BEL  31416	Spilleboudt brothers		BRYC	0,953	5	5,5	13	12	4,4	6	4	24,9
5 Harmony	IRL  1484	Jonny Swan		Howth Yacht Club	0,948	8	11	3	7	7,7	3	5	25,7
6 Superhero	GBR  5384	Toni Stoschek		RORC - BRYC	0,945	4	26,4	8	5	1,1	10	10	28,1
7 Trastada	GBR  6521	Roddy Angus / Dan Challis		Fairlie Yacht Club	0,957	10	7,7	1	8	26,4	7	6	29,7
8 Alf	BEL  8508	Jeremy Florizoone		KYCN	0,955	12	8,8	4	10	5,5	4	13	32,3
9 Général Tapioca	BEL  7548	Philippe Pilate		BRYC	0,956	3	2,2	5	1	26,4	24	24	35,2
10 Red Cloud	BEL  8500	Tom Florizoone		KYCN	0,946	9	9,9	9	4	6,6	13	9	37,6
11 A+	BEL  5678	Pierrard		VVW Nieuwpoort	0,942	16	3,3	10	9	8,8	12	8	39,1
12 Skippy's Ton	BEL  9179	Nicolas Lejeune / Jean Marie Gillès		KYCN	0,942	7	6,6	12	17	13,2	9	11	45,6
13 Philemon	FR  7962	Jean Ado		SNBSM	0,944	11	16,5	15	11	17,6	8	14	59
14 Crakajax	GBR  4080 T Richard & Ursula Hollis			RORC Cowes	0,903	14	12,1	11	16	15,4	11	15	63,1
15 Ballerine	FRA  9130      Charles Jacob / Grégoire Bargibant			KYCN	0,944	13	13,2	16	15	11	14	16	66,2
16 Fantasy	BEL  5394       Ian Van Burm			KYCN	0,934	15	14,3	14	18	12,1	15	12	67,4
17 Sage	GBR  5898      Owen Croft			Medway Yacht Club	0,938	19	17,6	17	14	26,4	16	20	83,6
18 Spip	BEL 5399        Thibaut Martin			KYCN	0,931	20	15,4	20	13	18,7	19	18	84,1
19 North Sea Three	BEL 8250       Ward Desoete			RNSYC	0,944	21	26,4	21	21	16,5	20	7	85,5
20 Half Capone	ESP  2752      Jean-Luc Courbon				0,963	17	26,4	19	19	14,3	17	19	86,3
21 Smokey Too	GBR  556         Adrian Pells			Harwich & Dovercourt SC	0,911	18	19,8	18	20	19,8	18	17	90,8
22 Father Bruin	BEL 1633        Jan Jakob Muyls			WskLum	0,902	24	18,7	22	23	26,4	21	24	108,7
23 M'Half Raz	BEL  1595       Manon Vatlet			BRYC	0,942	23	20,9	23	22	26,4	22	21	108,9