Dark'N'Stormy performs Round the Island Race hat-trick
by Louay Habib 27 Jun 2022 06:05 PDT
25 June 2022
Ian Atkins' GP42 Dark'N'Stormy achieved an historic triple triumph for the 2022 Round the Island Race; taking Monohull Line Honours, winning IRC Zero and the race overall under IRC lifting the coveted Gold Roman Bowl. The triple was last performed by Simon Le Bon's Drum in 1988.
After five hours of racing, including a full on foam up around the back of the island, runner up to Dark'N'Stormy, by just 63 seconds, was Reichel Pugh GP42 Khumbu sailed by Christian Hamilton and Guy Gillon. GP Zero Class boats dominated the 2022 Round the Island Race, both in terms of elapsed and IRC corrected time. Third was the De Graaf family racing Ker 43 Baraka GP. Ker 46 Van Uden skippered by Johnny Poortman, and Bertie Bicket's IC37 Fargo, also made the top ten after IRC time correction.
"We had an all-day full-on battle with Khumbu," commented Dark'N'Stormy 's navigator Mark Chisnell. "We got the early advantage off the line and up to The Needles, but we were in close company with Van Uden and Baraka right up there. After rounding to the Southside of the island, Khumbu came into us, and we managed to struggle them off. At St. Cats' we were very close together and engaged in many manoeuvres and sail changes - a real match race. We made a little error into the forts and Khumbu came back at us inshore. We had to work hard to hold them off. It was a tremendous honour to take monohull line honours and to win overall is just fantastic."
Dark'N'Stormy crew: Nick Bonner, Abby Childerley, Mark Chisnell, Tim Corney, James Crampton, Dan Brown, Jono Macbeth, Adam Lees, Dan Primrose, Ian Tillett, Ian Walker, Ruaridh Wright.
The Dark'N'Stormy team received a tremendous ovation at the Round the Island Race Prize Giving. Tactician Ian Walker gave a speech on behalf of the team.
"Thank you to the Island Sailing Club for keeping us all safe out there in a lot of breeze. This is such a wonderful race, I have done this race many times in the smallest and the biggest boats, it was a real privilege to sail with this team. Unfortunately, Ian Atkins the owner of Dark'N'Stormy, had managed to double book his schedule and was unable to race, so a big thank you to Ian for trusting us to race the boat, we made sure we didn't hit the wreck at The Needles! A big shout out to Khumbu who pushed us all the way and that is probably one of the reasons we did so well."
The GP Zero Class will be back in action for Round 3 of the 2022 Series at Cowes Week. A big welcome to the American Ker 40+ Tschuss skippered by Christian Zugel, which will be racing with all the GP Zero boats at Cowes Week from 30th July to the 5th August.
To stay tuned to the GP Zero Class visit Facebook page.