RC Laser Summer Series begins at Fleetwood Model Yacht Club
by Tony Wilson 6 Jun 03:32 PDT
2 June 2019
RC Laser Summer Series begins at Fleetwood © Tony Wilson
An awful weather forecast was to greet us up at Fleetwood for the opening four part Summer series. Rain was on the cards until early afternoon, but on arrival it hadn't actually started.
The wind was coming from the unfavourable side, so any beats were going to be short while heading South. Not being overly windy we had a split for As and B rig, which was again lighter than expected.
A cross over figure of eight course was set and for two laps. We had one newcomer to the fleet 'Walter', but no stranger to the club and that made us up to a good number of eleven entrants, and that on a dreary day.
As the races went on, the wind started to creep round, so we added another buoy. Eric Reid had won the first race but that was the only one that Shaun Holbeche was going to let him have.
Shaun led as usual and there was quite a bit of swapping sails going on. Some were going big and some were going back small again. The wind seem to be right in between sail sizes. With 'A' rig, you were chancing it and on the edge of your seat most of the time, but enjoyed the calm corners. With the 'B' rig you knew it wouldn't bite you on the run.
Before lunch, John Plant hit a home run and also Jim Lydon was able to sneak in a first. We had lunch and then just as we were heading out again came the rain. Not heavy, but enough to warrant rain gear and your TX Mit to keep dry. The wind seem to be getting up slightly and it was continuing to swing to the west, which called for another alteration to the course, but usually just the windward mark. On this last change we made the races just one lappers as the distance had already been increased due to using the central located lake buoys.
For the afternoon session we had completed a further six races to total twelve all together and it was now Peter Isles to finish on a good one. Shaun had done it again for the win and had also persisted for most of the day with the biggest sail except for the last race.
Second through to fourth place on the day had been separated by only 2 points, so we had had some good close racing throughout.
The day had turned out better than expected and it looked like the weather front had come in late by a good few hours. It had been a good turn out to start the Summer series with the next one in about three weeks time. Before that we have a double bonanza weekend for the North District series and National Laser TT. Saturday 15th June is at Fairhaven and Sunday 16th June over at Fleetwood. Some will more than likely be travelling north and stay for the weekend.
Results:
1 Shaun Holbeche 13 pts
2 Jim Lydon 35pts
3 Tony Wilson 36pts