Northern and Scottish MUSTO Skiff East Lothian Yacht Club Regatta – 1st & 2nd June 2019
Hosted by East Lothian Yacht Club, North Berwick, Scotland
Report by Ian Trotter
Photo by Natalie Hilton
Trotter ‘Trumps’ the Fleet to win the Scottish Skiff Nationals
A seventeen boat MUSTO fleet were joined by seven other skiffs to give a healthy fleet of 24 boats. The forecast looked fantastic however forecasters get it wrong as often as they get it right. So, we had the Sunday as forecast and Saturday was, to be quite frank, a waste of a Saturday. We were on the water for over 5 hours and managed to get an abandoned race in and a counter which was, to say the least, pretty random. A land and sea breeze fighting made it hard work for the O.D. and mark layers. Paul Rigg won the race, Jono Shelley 2nd and Ian Trotter 3rd.
Sunday dawned with a lighter wind than forecast but at least there was wind. The second race was sailed in pretty tough and trying conditions and was won by Jono, followed by Jamie Hilton and Dan Trotter 3rd. This was all about to change for the third race; the O.D. changed the course position and the wind arrived with a bang; in fact, the gusts were over 20 knots making it great fun and very testing. The race being won by Dan Trotter, Jono 2nd and senior Trotter 3rd. Some boats had found it hard going and started to go in but the hard core stayed out and had a great fourth race. The race was lead by Alistair Conn until an untimely capsize on the last run which left a Trotter 1 / 2…..younger first and Jono 3rd. The final race was a hard-fought affair and a Trotter 1 / 2 was again the result with Dad beating son; Josh Moran getting 3rd spot. Jono Shelley was last seen knife between teeth hacking away at his spinnaker which is now helping the sea birds on Bass Rock as nesting material.
Overall a great weekend and a well-deserved victory for Dan Trotter. Many thanks to E.L.Y.C and Ben, the O.D., who tried his best on Saturday but in his own words ‘would have been better off staying in bed’.
Special mention to the 800 guys who sailed very well to get amongst the MUSTO’s making handicap racing fun in the Scottish Skiff series.
Overall results for MUSTO Skiffs:
1st Dan Trotter
2nd Jono Shelley
3rd Ian Trotter
4th Jamie Hilton
5th Josh Moran
View full regatta results here: https://www.elyc.org.uk/resources/Documents/Regatta%202019.htm
View results in PDF version here: Northern and Scottish MUSTO Skiff ELYC Regatta – 2019 (PDF document)
