Report: Formula 18 TT at Minnis Bay Sailing Club 21/22 April 07
April 24, 2007 by Hugh Styles | 0 comments
Nearly 20 F18s descended on Minnis bay to share a weekends racing with A-Class, Hurricane, and Spitfire fleets. Saturday began with a light breeze and a midday start due to the weekends high spring tides. After a small delay, racing began in a gentle and fluky offshore force 1-2 breeze. The Nacra UK team of Adam Piggott/Ryan Crawford took an early lead which they held for the first lap only to be overhauled by their team-mates Grant Piggott/Greg Windle. Although places constantly changed behind, these two boats held off any real challenge. And finished in that order.
Nearly 20 F18s descended on Minnis bay to share a weekends racing with A-Class, Hurricane, and Spitfire fleets. Saturday began with a light breeze and a midday start due to the weekends high spring tides. After a small delay, racing began in a gentle and fluky offshore force 1-2 breeze. The Nacra UK team of Adam Piggott/Ryan Crawford took an early lead which they held for the first lap only to be overhauled by their team-mates Grant Piggott/Greg Windle. Although places constantly changed behind, these two boats held off any real challenge. And finished in that order.
Race 2 saw an early sea breeze kick in which was to build for the remainder of the day. James/Gillian Power and Stuart Gummer/Ellen Foreshore made good starts getting out of the tide onto the right hand side of the course early, they were hotly pursued by Leo Farrow/Robbie-Jon Garca and Piggott/Crawford. Gummer/Foreshore’s challenge was not helped by a mainsheet problem, dropping them back, a late challenge by the Capricorn of Bartlett/Robinson saw them steal third place.
As the wind further increased for race 3, Piggott/Crawford started best managing a close port-end-flyer to cross the fleet, despite this they could not hold off Power/Power and Gummer/Foreshaw. Farrow/Garca were also excelling in these conditions managing to finish a close third.
Sunday began with a light gradient breeze and a battle between this and the sea breeze began to take place, this led to a long wait before any racing was possible. As it turned out the wait was well worth it as the fleet were treated to a freshening offshore force 4. Piggott/Carwford started well and took an initial lead but Gummer/Foreshaw managed to play the tides better to take the race by a narrow margin. The tides once again caused problems within the fleet with a generous anchor line on the committee boat providing some entertainment (hopefully someone had a camera handy)!
The race officer did well to turn around the fleet in time to manage a final race before the deadline, even with the added problem of the days strongest tide. Gummer/Foreshaw made a good start at the pin end and had a substantial lead by the windward mark. Behind them there was some extremely close racing between Piggott/Crawford, Piggott/Windle, and Power/Power, these battles being made more interesting by the Spitfire start coinciding with the first upwind gate! Despite a brave challenge from Piggott/Crawford, Gummer/Foreshaw held their lead to the finish with Piggott/Windle clinching third and Power/Power being deemed OCS. This was enough for Gummer/Foreshaw to take the event by a single point from the makeshift Nacra teams of Piggott/Crawford, with fellow Nacra sailors Piggott/Windle in third place. With Eurocat beginning next weekend, the fleet will have been pleased to have had such great conditions and close racing in order to help them prepare to face Europes best talent.
Thanks must go out to Minnis Bay Sailing Club and all their volunteers for putting on such a good event and making all of the sailors feel very welcome.
