Aspire Merlin Rocket National Championship at Looe Sailing Club - Day 3

Aspire Merlin Rocket Nationals at Looe day 3 © Neil Richardson

HD Sails Tuesday - Day Three

It was another sunny morning in Looe with the forecast for a force 3-4 from the South South West. Another glamorous day was in store and so it proved with the first race for the West Country Trophy followed by the main event of the week, the crew's race.

Race four started under black flag following a general recall and only Dan Willet and Pete Nicholson were BFD. An initial left-hander favoured those at the pin but you needed to be able to tack early and take the gains as the breeze went back right in the second half of the beat.

Christian and Sam were again leaders at the top mark and looked like they would do a horizon job with their clear speed advantage. However, Nick and Toby who had just squeezed round in second never gave up the chase, playing the shifts expertly to keep in contention.

Aspire Merlin Rocket Nationals at Looe day 3 - photo © Neil Richardson

The course was Sausage-Triangle-Sausage-Triangle and the second reach was a toenail on the edge three-sailer. On this final leg to the finish Nick was able to exploit both his significant leverage on the max transom width of his JT design together with a useful tear in his spinnaker which depowered him enough to be able to drive hard and chase down Christian and Sam and pass them at the death.

Behind this epic tussle, the battle for the top six was extremely tight with a number of new faces showing well. Newly-weds George and Sophie Yeoman came home tenth, just ahead of David and Vicky Lenz. Further up the track the Chrises Gould and Kilsby again showed great pace and tactical positioning to take third holding off the challenge of Taxi and Pippa in fourth and big climbers Roger Gilbert and James Stewart in fifth. Jon Gorringe and Pete Gray kept themselves in the top three overall with a hard fought sixth.

So on to the main event, the crew's race where not only do the crews get the opportunity to show just how much latent talent is being neglected at the front of the boat, but helms who are always quick to offer words of advice, get to find out just how challenging the front end of a Merlin can be.

After the obligatory general recall, the fleet were away cleanly into a healthy force four with some chunky waves. Pete Gray, himself no mean helm, had the Gorringe fully deployed to power into the lead at the top mark from Arthur and Will Henderson nose forward from Frances Gifford and Tim Fells. On the run, Ally and Simon Potts put on their RS200 heads to hot up the angles and challenge for the lead.

However, there was no stopping Pete and Jon on the upwind legs and then the tight second reach. Your correspondent was gamely stretching his 60 year-old legs for a final time to help Frances take the final podium place behind Ally and Simon. Great fun was had by all and new bragging rights won for another year.

Tonight is the other main event of the week, Fancy Dress, with team's interpreting their boat names in creative and in some cases downright worrying ways.

merlinrocketchamps.com

Aspire Merlin Rocket Nationals at Looe day 3 - photo © Neil Richardson

Results after day 3:

Aspire Merlin Rocket Nationals at Looe day 3 - photo © Neil Richardson