RS Aeros at the Wickford Regatta

by Marc Jacobi 12 Jun 2018 04:34 PDT 9-10 June 2018

RS Aeros at the Wickford Regatta © Wickford Yacht Club

I think people are still a bit traumatized by the 25-30+ knot breezes experienced in 2016, but this year's Wickford Regatta was quite light; we might have seen 8-10 knots at times on Saturday.

Five races were sailed in all: four Saturday (followed by an *amazing* apres-sailing dinner, including DIY ice cream sundaes - your scribe went back for seconds), then one very light air race on Sunday before the Northerly completely died.

15 RS Aeros contested this year's event. The size and quality of the fleet was definitely noticed! What was especially neat is that 11 owners were registered, indicating the building take rate of boats in the New England area. The level of competition continues to increase with sailors progressively learning the RS Aero and upping skills with a good ethos of sharing knowledge.

The charterers made their presences felt. Quentin Chafee, sailing an RS Aero for the first time, was impressively quick, and with great starts was often in the top two or three at the first weather marks; he ended up top RS Aero 7 rig and eighth overall. Phil Myerson sailed an RS Aero 9 for the first time and quickly figured it out, walking away from the fleet early in race five (and ending up 5th overall). Ben Chafee and Alan Harris, both Zim Sailing employees, rounded out the charterers, getting first-hand experience sailing boats they love to move around their shop and deliver - due to the RS Aero's 66 lb, (30kg) hull weight, no doubt.

The fleet is getting faster and faster upwind, as evinced by Timothy Desmond (second Overall), Eric Aker (third) and Jim Myers (fourth). These three were seen duking it out at the front of the fleet on the beats, often pointing higher than me while maintaining pace. I mostly made moves downwind, working little breeze variations and waves that little bit extra to eek out the boat lengths. At the clinic before the Newport Regatta (July 6, then racing on 7-8) we can focus on reaching and running set-up and technique. See you there!

Overall Results:

Pos	Sail No	Helm	R1	R2	R3	R4	R5	Pts
1	2121	Marc Jacobi	[1]	1	1	1	1	4
2	1041	Tim Desmond	2	3	[5]	2	2	9
3	1422	Eric Aker	[6]	2	4	4	4	14
4	1987	Jim Myers	3	4	2	[12]	8	17
5	6022	Philip Myerson	[7]	7	3	5	5	20
6	2507	Derek Stow	5	6	[16/DNF]	7	3	21
7	1282	Sam Sylvester	4	8	7	3	[10]	22
8	2276	Quentin Chafee	8	[9]	6	6	7	27
9	1042	Bill Shaw	[10]	5	8	10	6	29
10	2209	Benjamin Chafee	[11]	11	9	9	9	38
11	2249	Andrew McConnell	9	10	10	[11]	11	40
12	1983	David Solnick	12	12	11	8	[16/DNF]	43
13	1424	Melissa Solnick	13	14	12	13	[16/DNF]	52
14	2122	Alan Harris	14	13	13	14	[16/DNC]	54
15	1988	Michael Gavin	[16/DNC]	C	C	C	C	64

Full details of the North American RS Aero events list for 2018 can be found here