Musto Skiffs at Stokes Bay 24th-25th April

Nearly 30 Musto Skiff’s arrived at Stokes Bay for their annual open meeting over the weekend of 24th-25th April and were joined by a strong fleet of RS700’s and 800’s.

Saturday produced better than expected conditions with sun and a fresh easterly wind between 8-12 knots, moving South Easterly through the course of the day. Spring tides moving from West to East whipped up some short chop and coupled with the sun worshippers in the Solent out for their annual trip on their yachts and speed boats the water seemed even more confused.

The decision was made to start the RS800’s off first, sailing the outer loop, followed by the Mustos and RS700’s racing together on the inner loop.

In the first race the tide was pushing the fleet up onto the line. Bruce Keen and the ever stylish Dan Vincent got the best starts at the pin end leading the fleet over to the left. Keen controlled the fleet as Dan Henderson picked his way through the fleet to move up to third. Vincent had however jumped the gun and this promoted Henderson to second and Dan Ward, from Frensham Ponds and Stokes Bay SC, to third.

Race 2 saw a recall and handful of sailors collect black flags having not accounted for the increasing current pushing the boats upwind. On the restart Vincent came up trumps approaching from the left with Graeme Oliver and Gavin Brewer following. The leaders headed off to the right downwind whilst Keen, rounding in the 10’s, was the first to gybe immediately round the spacer mark with Ward playing copycat. The extra breeze on the left paid dividends and Keen moved into the lead by the leeward mark, with Henderson following the same route into 2nd and Ward 3rd. Keen and Henderson fought a close battle with Keen staying just ahead to take another win.

The final race of the day and the sun kissed sailors had a clean start. Keen was first again to the top mark, arriving from the left along with Vincent. Close behind was Neil Upton-Brown and Ward arriving from the right. The experienced and handsome pond sailor Ward squeezed ahead of Vincent on the downwind to move into 2nd. Henderson moving through the fleet had a battle with Vincent, Oliver and Upton-Brown for third, with Upton-Brown looking like he had it until an unfortunate capsize on the final downwind. Keen completed the perfect day with a third win, followed by Ward and Henderson.

Sunday dawned with more wind, about 15 knots and gusty from the South West. The current was moving from East to West against the wind so again the waves were whipped up. The challenge became to stop your bow going through each wave both uphill and down.

The first race of the day, Keen and Vincent arrived together at the top mark from the left. Oliver was close behind and managed to move into the lead on the second lap showing great downwind speed. Oliver looked to be on to a win but Keen wasn’t keen (sorry!) and managed to edge ahead to win by a short head. Vincent took third with Tom Wright showing up well in 4th.

Race 5, Dave Poston led from the left, Ward close behind from the right and Mike Palfreman in hot pursuit. Oliver and Keen made up a lot of ground to catch the leading bunch by the leeward mark. With a lull in the wind Palefreman had a moment of inspiration seeing a stronger band of wind to the left and leaving the leading bunch whilst they played in the middle of the beat. He led comfortably taking the win from Keen with Henderson pulling through after Oliver went for an unexpected dip during a hoist. Rich Pelley was close behind but played dodgems with an RS800 unluckily capsizing close to the finish.

The exciting racing encouraged some yachts to join in, with a 35ft yacht showing excellent timing coming through the start line bang on the gun so Gav Brewer politely requested, in true Portsmouth stylie, that as they hadn’t paid the entry fee therefore were not allowed to race, or something like that.

The final race was tight at the first mark between Vincent, Oliver, Keen and Poston. Brendan Jenner also showed good speed to round up at the top. Keen and Oliver pulled away whilst Henderson pulled up to compete with Vincent for third. It ended with Keen once again showing his superiority taking his fifth win, Oliver second and Henderson third.

Overall Keen took the victory from Henderson in second and Ward in third. Stokes Bay SC did a great job of setting good courses in a strong tide, keeping time between races to a minimum and as usual were efficient with their organisation on shore.

Results can be found at,

http://www.stokesbay-sc.co.uk/result/open/musto_results.htm

Overall results Place Sail No Helm Club Race 1 Race 2 Race 3 Race 4 Race 5 Race 6 Gr Pts Nt Pts
24Apr 24Apr 24Apr 25Apr 25Apr 25Apr
1 205 Bruce Keen Stokes Bay SC 1 1 1 1 (2) 1 7 5
2 409 Daniel Henderson Thorpe Bay YC 2 2 3 (7) 3 3 20 13
3 286 Dan Ward Stokes Bay SC 3 3 2 (16) 4 6 34 18
4 363 Graeme Oliver Whitstable YC (29) 4 5 2 7 2 49 20
5 193 Dan Vincent Stokes Bay SC (29) 5 4 3 5 4 50 21
6 251 Neil Upton-Brown Hayling Island SC 5 (29) 7 6 8 5 60 31
7 295 Mike Palfreman Stokes Bay SC 9 6 8 9 1 (12) 45 33
8 324 Dave Poston Stokes Bay SC 4 (29) 12 5 6 7 63 34
9 209 Tom Wright Rutland SC 6 (29) 14 4 12 11 76 47
10 290 Alex Cooper Stokes Bay SC 8 10 9 (15) 14 8 64 49
11 281 Jamie Hilton Datchet Water SC 10 (11) 11 11 10 9 62 51
12 131 Richard Pelley Stokes Bay SC (19) 16 6 8 9 13 71 52
13 394 Nigel Walbank Lymington Town SC 12 9 13 13 (15) 15 77 62
14 146 Griff Tanner Queen Mary SC 7 17 23 10 11 (29) 97 68
15 284 Sergei Samus Whitstable YC 13 8 15 12 22 (29) 99 70
16 222 Paddy Gamble Stokes Bay SC 11 (29) 10 14 21 18 103 74
17 260 Richard Smith Blue Circle SC 22 7 (29) 17 13 17 105 76
18 362 Dan Parsons Whitstable YC 17 13 16 (21) 16 14 97 76
19 97 Gavin Brewer Stokes Bay SC 15 19 17 18 (20) 16 105 85
20 376 Brendan Jenner Homeless (24) 18 24 20 18 10 114 90
21 375 Mark Ponsford Stokes Bay SC 16 (29) 19 19 19 19 121 92
22 282 Mark Goalen Queen Mary SC 14 15 18 22 (29) 29 127 98
23 287 Peter Sanders Queen Mary SC 21 21 21 (23) 17 20 123 100
24 333 Tim Chapman Rutland SC 20 14 20 (29) 29 29 141 112
25 315 Andy Le Grice Stokes Bay SC 25 20 22 (29) 24 21 141 112
26 178 Ian Marshall Oxford SC 18 12 (29) 29 29 29 146 117
27 169 David Annan Grafham Water SC 23 22 25 24 23 (29) 146 117
28 153 Adam Kitchen Chichester YC 26 (29) 29 29 29 29 171 142

Races in brackets () are discards.
There were 6 races scheduled in this series,
6 races have been sailed.
5 have been counted.