Posted by Victoria Bonham Carter

We had a great turn out last Saturday for our first race of the season. In rather blustery conditions, 9 boats successfully made it round the course. Tim Robinson set us an excellent course and being mindful of our ‘first night nerves’ let us off the ‘gybes’ which probably gave the safety boat team a more relaxing time and certainly allowed the rest of us to get back in the groove.


Eric Williams has our first race report of the year: 

Wind West South West shifty, gusty with some holes, a great day to sort our boats out and see how rusty we are after a winter’s break. 

We started the race down river to D, which was difficult as the wind freed and headed all the way. Charles and Ned Nicholsen and Ben and Polly Savage showed us the way to do it, followed by Eric Williams and Symon Stratton. Eric just luffed round the mark but Symon clipped Eric when tacking for the mark and had to do a turn. The next leg to E was again difficult as the wind was playing tricks and switching on and off. Mary Montagu made a clever move here and got ahead of Eric, Victoria and Edward Bonham Carter and Red Johnson. The next leg to A was also tricky particularly off Curtle Mead and Victoria and Mary made good mark roundings. Then we were off to C and Charles continued to outpace us all followed by Ben. A little further behind Mary, Eric and Victoria were having a good scrap starting the next lap. Charles and Ben stayed ahead and Eric was third, chased hard by Victoria. The fleet behind were all having a good battle and Symon was moving forward after his unfortunate penalty. 

The first few boats stayed in position back to A but the run to C closed the fleet up again excluding Charles who was sailing beautifully. The race was shortened from D with a starboard rounding and Eric managed to get a favourable shift to get round 2nd, followed by Victoria, Ben and Mary. 

I think everyone really enjoyed their first race in very testing conditions. 

We had a most enjoyable drink and some food afterwards and Mary welcomed our new members and thanked our volunteers for a most enjoyable afternoon: Ginna Gaynor on the Starting Platform, Tim Robinson as Race Officer, Nick Bentley-Buckle and John Pemberton in the safety boat and Frances Robinson and Ross McGinn for refreshments.  


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NEXT RACE   Race 2    Saturday, 8th April                                                                        
                               

 Boat buoyancy testing         13.00                                                                                                        Race Start 14.00       HT 13.05 


Starting Platform       Gerry Marling-Roberts
Race Officer              Bill Vance
Safety Boat                Lizzie Anders and Erica Neve
Refreshments            Anna Rostand


VOLUNTEERING OPPORTUNITIES


RACE 3   All slots filled


RACE 4   Sunday 7th May  12.00      HT  12.40

Starting Platform     Ginna Gaynor
Race Officer            Volunteer needed
Safety Boat              Mary Montagu + volunteer needed
Refreshments           Coronation Celebration  BBQ & Drinks courtesy of RWD
Shore support          Volunteers needed



It was wonderful to see so many new members on the bank last Saturday and I very much hope you can join us on the river soon.

Yours aye,

Victoria Bonham Carter

Captain of Scows