MYA Scottish District IOM Travellers 3 at Buchanness Radio Yacht Club
by Ian Dundas 22 Sep 14:44 PDT
19 September 2026
MYA Scottish District IOM Travellers 3 at Buchanness RYC © Brian Crawford
The third event of the 2026 MYA Scottish District IOM Travellers Series was hosted by Buchanness MYC at Forehill Reservoir near Peterhead. Forehill Reservoir, with its elevated walkways and clear open water, is renowned for delivering quality radio sailing racing in breezy conditions. Again, this year it did not disappoint.
The seven entrants came from five clubs across Scotland; Tayside, Buchanness, Greenock, Kinghorn and Paisley with the furthest travelled skippers travelling from the Scottish Borders and across from the Gourock on the Clyde.
The boats in the fleet were made up of some of the latest IOM designs, Venti and BritPop!, beautiful home-built boats Corbie 6, Alternative and Buzz 3 and a couple of well finished 3D printed Proteus designs. At the time of registration and check measurement skippers rigged their boats with the larger A rig but as the start time approached and the wind settled into a WSW direction it was clear that B rig was more suited to the conditions.
A long windward–leeward course was set by RO Ian Dundas which was square to the wind with upwind turning marks and a downwind gate, each race requiring three beats finishing between the windward and spreader marks.
Race 1 started on time and was won by Tich Summers sailing his recently finished 3D printed Proteus ahead of Simon Thomson sailing a BritPop! and John Owens sailing a Venti. During the race Gordon Allison, also sailing a Proteus, retired to change rig.
In the early races, starts were critical and any boat recalled as over the line had a hard time to catch up the fleet. The large course allowed close crosses up the beat to be reversed on the next cross. Downwind it was important to be able to surf in the gusts, to be on the right gybe and to round the best gate mark. The wind direction held steady but there were sufficient shifts and gusts to make it interesting.
Six races were completed before lunch with Tich and John sharing 3 first places each and Simon bagging a string of consistent 2nd place finishes. The home-built boats of David Redpath and Colin McGinnis were in touch and pushed the leading boats. Unfortunately, Gordon Allison experienced electrical issues and was an early retirement from the event. Richard Rowan after a couple of races using his B rig decided to change down to his smaller C rig but at that time the wind strength was still favouring the B rig.
After lunch the wind strength increased slightly. In Race 7 a strong gust downwind caused boats to be overpowered resulting in nosediving. In such a gust Simon’s BritPop! locked up with Tich’s Proteus requiring pondside rescue of the tangled boats. John went on to win this race with Richard coming a close second with his C rig now showing it was suited to the conditions.
From Race 8 through to the end of the day all boats elected to change down to their smaller C rig. Unfortunately, some had not recently used their C rig and found they were either lacking the correct fittings or required significant adjustment or repair. There was a lot of rummaging through toolboxes!
Over the afternoon the wind again strengthened slightly and classic high-speed racing under bright skies was enjoyed by all. By Race 12 all boats had completed repairs and were fully functioning on the water although John then suffered a shroud failure in race 13 which he had to repair and hence missing two races.
In all 16 races were held over the day which allowed 3 discards to be applied. Tich Summers won the event with a very consistent score at the front of the fleet, followed by John Owens in 2nd place who pipped Simon Thomson on countback.
At the prizegiving Tich thanked the Buchanness Club for their hospitality and the Race Team for their efforts to provide quality racing in such strong wind conditions. David Redpath was awarded a prize for Most Endeavour making the long trip up from the Scottish Borders and for rebuilding his C rig when some key parts were found to be missing and Alan McKechnie from the race team was also rewarded for his valuable contribution over the day.
Race Team: Ian Dundas (RO), Ali Law (ARO), Brian Crawford (Scorer), Ian Thomson, Alan McKechnie and David Ross.
Overall Results:
| Pos | Design | Sail No | Helm | Club | R1 | R2 | R3 | R4 | R5 | R6 | R7 | R8 | R9 | R10 | R11 | R12 | R13 | R14 | R15 | R16 | Pts |
|---|
| 1 | Proteus | 7 | Brian Summers | Tayside RSC | 1 | 3 | 1 | 5 | 1 | 3 | 1.8 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 17.8 |
| 2 | Venti | 33 | John Owens | Buchanness MYC | 3 | 1 | 3 | 1 | 3 | 1 | 1 | 8 | 3 | 1 | 2 | 6 | 8 | 8 | 2 | 3 | 30 |
| 3 | BritPop! | 101 | Simon Thomson | Greenock MY&PBC | 2 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 6 | 8 | 8 | 3 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 1 | 4 | 4 | 30 |
| 4 | Buzz 3C | 45 | Colin McGinnis | Tayside RSC | 4 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 5 | 4 | 3 | 2 | 2 | 5 | 5 | 3 | 5 | 4 | 6 | 6 | 51 |
| 5 | Corbie 6 | 40 | David Redpath | Kinghorn RSC | 5 | 5 | 4 | 3 | 4 | 8 | 5 | 8 | 8 | 4 | 8 | 4 | 2 | 3 | 3 | 5 | 55 |
| 6 | Alternative | 86 | Richard Rowan | Greenock MY&PBC | 6 | 7 | 8 | 4 | 6 | 5 | 2 | 3 | 8 | 8 | 4 | 5 | 4 | 5 | 5 | 2 | 58 |
| 7 | Proteus | 62 | Gordon Allison | Paisley MYC | 8 | 6 | 8 | 8 | 8 | 8 | 8 | 8 | 8 | 8 | 8 | 8 | 8 | 8 | 8 | 8 | 102 |