Contender Open at Poole Yacht Club
by Graham Scott 28 Jun 2017 08:02 PDT
24-25 June 2017
Contenders at Poole © Mike Millard
The upcoming World Championships in Sonderborg, Denmark and a fine weather forecast was enough to lure a season best fleet of 25 boats to Poole Yacht Club for some much needed race practice.
With a stronger than predicted 15-18 knots of breeze, former World Champion Simon Mussell was soon in the lead of race one followed by two more former (long, long time ago) World Champions Graham Scott and Stuart Jones. However a capsize at the gybe mark by Mussell let them through. Scott led to what he thought was the finish but it turned out it wasn't handing the race to Jones with Nick Noble getting second and Mussell recovering to third.
Race two saw Mussell hounded by a rapid and peaking at the right time Ed Presley followed by a duelling team Nob-Tag with Carl Tagoe just getting the better of Nick.
Saturday's final race was almost a replay of race two except this time Carl and Nick's positions were reversed leading to a tense post race team de-brief.
Once ashore, welcome tea and cakes were provided, followed by a meal and not one but two live bands although it turns out these were not actually just for the Contender fleet's benefit-nice touch though!
Sunday dawned with more wind than forecast again much to Rodger White's delight.
Overnight leader Mussell stormed away in the first race followed by a tight group consisting of Nick Noble, Gary Langdown and Ed Presley. However a large hole on the second reach let Scott through from seventh to first which he just held onto for the rest of the race after a close tussle with Noble.
In an increasing breeze race five favoured (like all the starts) the pin end and Mussell was off again. This time Langdown was flying and looking like rounding second when his old nemesis 'the tack' came back to haunt him, letting Jones and Scott through. Mussell extended to win easily with Scott just getting the better of Jones after a close battle.
In the final race the wind was gusting up to twenty knots and Ed Presley finally showed his Saturday form with a great win over Mussell and Noble.
So overall it was a relatively easy win and pre-Worlds morale boost for Simon Mussell. Nick Noble showed good form, speed and consistency to come second and Ed Presley found real speed at times to take third.
Many thanks to Poole Yacht Club for a great event especially our fellow competitor Dave Evans who did a lot of the organising.