Results / RS Fat Face Racing Circuit Weymouth SC - 10/06/2006

Sixth round of the Fat Face RS200 Racing Circuit at Weymouth SC � two very different set of conditions. Fifty RS200�s travelled to Weymouth SC for the sixth round of the Fat Face Racing Circuit and the first visit of the year to the south coast. Brian Clough must have visited Weymouth on such weekends of this when he first used the clich� �a game of two halves� as this is the only way to describe the widely different conditions. Friday had seen strong easterly breezes so there were proper waves in Weymouth Bay on Saturday. Along with bright sunshine, 16-20 knot from the east and warm wind this gave majestic conditions to welcome the fleet as they came out of Weymouth Harbour. Whilst the fleet blasted around the bay unfortunately the late arriving race officer was making very hard work of laying a course, which resulted in far too long a postponement; by the end of the day this was too become important. Race 1 and former National Champions Tom Hewitson, with Fiona Clark crewing and David Giles with Kita Carpenter; were 1.2 at the first mark. The Hewitson/Clark combination were in their stride and stayed in a comfortable lead throughout the race to win. The Bristol Corinthian boats were in good form to pull through with Ian Pickard/Loopy Lucy Matthews second, Pete Vincent/Tessa Nicholls third and Nick Charles/Juliet Kingsnorth fourth. Steve Dunn/Noelle Vidal were over the line at the start and took time to return; their recovery in a 50 boat fleet to 6th was both remarkable and later to prove crucial. For the start of race 2 the wind had slightly eased to 14 to 16 knots and this time David Giles/Kita Carpenter went hard left to great dividends to lead at the first mark, which they held to win. With the wind slowly easing Dunn/Vidal pulled through to second with Jon Lewis/KT Nichol third and Vincent/Nicholls fourth. Right at the end of the race the breeze that had been fading just completely shut off. Just as everyone thought that was it for the day a gentle southeasterly gave the PRO just enough wind and time to set a course. Lewis/Nichol were motoring well and led after a true opening beat. Then what wind there was swung so the second lap became a fetch/broad reach. Lewis/Nichol won from the Bristol Corinthian form girls Trudie/Danbury/Karen Baker; Sarah Taylor/Lucy Matthews in 2nd and 3rd with RSs cover girl Prue Roome in 4th with some help from husband Harry. You have to say it was a shame that we wasted the earlier glorious conditions. All this resulted in the horror story for the fleet of your author leading overnight; rest assured I did not point this out to anyone! Sunday and what a difference a day makes. There was no sun and hardly any wind, there was also some mist; of course I did not suggest that perhaps it was not possible to sail due to poor visibility. By 10.15 the fleet launched into a very flat sea with a gentle breeze that never settled down to give the race team a nightmare although they tried very hard to give us good racing. There was much quick work by the mark layers but every time a course was laid and flags raised then the wind moved or faded. Having adversely commented on their work on Saturday I now felt hugely sorry for the race team and thanked god I was not the race officer. It was too their credit that we even got two races in. Race 4 and the fleet wanted to start near the committee boat to be as far away as possible from the military band killing songs on Weymouth sea front. Alex Taylor/Emma Clarke won the start and led for the first lap but were OCS. Pickard/Loopy led into the final run but Hewitson/Clark went round the outside to win, Gareth Robinson/Willow Holland from Parkstone were third and Dunn/Vidal fourth. After much more mark shifting and an abandoned K6 race a hopeful force 2 came in from the southwest and race 5 started at the first attempt. Lizzie Edwards/Pippa Williams found the on button for their engine and led at the first mark. It stayed close at the front but the duo hung onto win from Richard/Paru Edwards from Parkstone and Andy/Jill Peters. The wind thought that was too easy and then clocked through 100 degrees. It was now after two o clock and the race officer made the wise decision that by the time he had moved the course and tried to start most of the fleets attention would be on the drive home and called it a day. On the sail in no one was certain who had won, England�s lower order would loved to have scored the leading helms scores against Sri Lanka. Once everyone had stopped using both the helms and crews toes and fingers we realised that Steve Dunn and Noelle Vidal had won by a point from Hewitson/Clark and Pickard/Loopy. Remarkably they were the only team to score 4 top ten results. They counted their race 1 result and all the work of recovering from being over the line totally paid. The silver division was equally close; Wembley�s Stephen Janering/Daniel Scott just won ahead of Fiona Hall/Paul Rigg and Parkstone�s Will Storey/Kate Havill. Frensham�s Katrina Gilbert/Jenny Rust won the bronze division from Highcliffes Alan Tarrant/Charlotte Cotter. The overnight leader faded somewhat but did not want to peak too soon before the Nationals. Round seven of the Fat Face Circuit is in a fortnight in sunny Devon at Brixham.