Garmin Hamble Winter Series - Hamble River crew among 6 perfect scores

by Jonty Sherwill on 27 Oct 2010 Garmin Hamble Winter Series - Sunday’s steady northerly breeze produced six double wins from the seven classes in the Garmin Black Group fleet, including those from ‘Polly’ and ‘Festine Lente’ in IRC4 and the Sigma 38s.

Both are owned by HRSC members, two generations of the Meakins family, Ben and his parents Philip and Lynda. The other double winners who joined them to collect the Spinlock day prizes for best overall performances were Mervyn Hughes’ ‘Jua Kali’ in IRC0, the Apthorp’s ‘J-Dream’ in the J/109s, Mike and Jamie Holmes’ ‘Jika-Jika’ in IRC3, and Tim Harrington’s X-35 ‘Vortex’, that now leads IRC1 with a stunning five firsts and a second.

With a bumper turn out of yachts in the Black Group, surprisingly only 21 of the 40 sportsboats entered in the three classes turned out for White Group racing on this lovely day. Gary Shaffer’s ‘Big Grin’ and the X-Treme 25 steered by Ian Wilson were welcome guests in the outgoing RORC SBR class.

Alongside the main Garmin series at the weekend was the concluding round of the Bugle Hamble Big Boat Series. Saturday’s racing was marked by an unexpected squall when 12–15 knots of westerly breeze leapt to 40 knots at precisely 1300hrs.

It was soon over but Race Director Jamie Wilkinson had immediately signaled an abandonment, and the
two fleets returned for a restart of Race 3.

In the Level Racing 45 Class the weekend's race wins were shared between Jerry Otter’s ‘Werewolf’, Stewart Whitehead’s ‘Rebel’, and Niklas Zennstrom’s ‘Ran’, with ‘Ran’ maintaining her first round lead to win the championship with 7 firsts from 11 starts.

The wide ranging Big Boat IRC Class was dominated by Peter Rutter's 'Quokka 8', with 6 wins in her scoreline. Ian Matthews' second placed J/122 'Jinja' and Jim Macgregor's Elan 410 'Premier Flair' grabbed a win each, with the top rating Farr 52 'Bob' of Gray and Laidlaw scoring two firsts in her tally to take third place overall in the class.

The Bugle's Oliver Weeks presented the overall trophies and prizes, and the whole fleet were invited to enjoy live music at the Bugle in Hamble that evening. The Spinlock day prizes were presented by James Hall and Simon Crowther.

Full details of the 2010 Garmin Hamble Winter Series are available at: www.garminhamblewinterseries.co.uk

Results: http://www.garminhamblewinterseries.co.uk/HWSResults.php?SessionCRC=-945627362.