EAORA Janes Cup report – Fleet off to a good start

by Tony Merewether on 3 May 2010 At 08.00 in a light westerly breeze the East Anglian Offshore Racing Association (EAORA) fleet started the first 50 mile leg of the back to back weekend from Burnham on Crouch to the Medway.

Class three was led off the line by Tony and Chuffy Merewether’s ‘Amazon’, but by the end of the river both Russell Walker’s ‘Cosmic Dancer’ and Bob Tubbs’ ‘Scaramouche III’ had come through on the broad reach out to the Whitaker.

Class two was led away by Stan Fenton on his first outing in his new J-105 ‘Fay J’ with the reaching conditions to his liking, followed closely by Adrian Lower’s ‘Selene’ with her enormous spinnaker towering over the smaller boats.

Class one were a little too eager at the start with both Alan Bartlett’s ‘Inn Spirit’ and Team Bassett, Magee and Minter in ‘Oz Privateer’ both over the line with the fair tide under them and had to restart leaving Angus Bates’ ‘Assarain IV’ to take the lead.

With only an hour before the tide turned against the fleet, the order on the water was all important for the final result, as by the time the fleet rounded the Whitaker buoy the tide was nearly running at two knots in the wrong direction, making it a slow down wind rounding and a big opening gate.

‘Cosmic Dancer’ went round first, followed by ‘Assarain IV’ and then Robbie and Pippa Stewart’s ‘Booty’ with the leaders stretching away and out of sight from the back markers with the tide under them in a light beat with the wind now from the south-west, towards Blacktail Spit off Shoeburyness.

The wind became even lighter for the downwind leg across the estuary with ‘Cosmic Dancer’ followed by ‘Assarain IV’ just rounding the Oaze special mark before the following pack had to kedge with the leading two boats then kedging at South Shoebury for a while with about five or six miles now separating the fleet from front to back.

A light south-easterly eventually filled in with ‘Cosmic Dancer’ relinquishing her lead, which she had held from the start, at East Cant before the final reach in to Garrison Point.

There was one more sting in the tail with the wind becoming lighter again and as the rain began to fall the tide turned and progress across the entrance of the Medway became extremely slow.

The race officer shortened the course at South Kent just inside the river entrance but it was still a leg too far with slow drifting conditions along the western shore against the tide to the finish, but for ‘Oz Privateer’ and ‘Amazon’ who both ran out of wind when crossing the main channel and were shot backwards with the 2.5 knot foul tide back out to sea and both retired.

Russell Walker in ‘Cosmic Dancer’ deservedly won the Janes Cup overall and class three by over 20 minutes from ‘Assarain IV’ who also won class one and third overall was Jonathan Webb’s ‘J’Ouvert’. Class two was won by ‘Selene’.