South Bank Sailing Club Blog

A grey and damp afternoon, with very little wind, greeted the few souls who turned out for the first race of the Goodwin Cup series. After much humming and a no little hawing, it was decided that a race could be held. Inevitably, our arrival at the slipway coincided with some launches from the Boathouse, but eventually our five dry-suited hopefuls – Allan and Steph in the Enterprise, and Henry Josh and Renato in Lasers – made it by hook or crook to the downriver side of the start line. A two- buoy, four lap (ha!) course was to be attempted. Your race officer for once got the timing right, and as the start bell jangled Renato was at the line at almost full speed, followed by the Enterprise, with Henry and Josh a little further back. A fairly rapid beat over the tide to the top mark and the fleet compressed in their attempts to broad reach back downriver. It seemed for a while that these would be unsuccessful, but the skill of the sailors and/or a slight increase in wind strength brought...

Considering how chilly it was, it was great to see so many sailors come down for yesterday’s sail. It was very kind of Daniel and son James to man the safety boat and lay a course for us. No rowers on the ramp – wonderful!  So off we went – a triangular course with a sausage was set with three laps to complete. Sina and Ben in the 420, Jen and Ana in Enfin the Enterprise, new member Joshua, Henry, Tom G fresh from Singapore and Andy all in lasers, Roland in his Topaz Race and me in my Solo. The NW breeze was quite a bit lighter than forecast but we had a lovely outing with Tom leading for three quarters of the race but in the final quarter Henry and Andy overtook both Tom and I to take the first two places.  Joshua had some boom problems before we started but luckily Daniel managed to sort it. Great to get out after too many days being cancelled for lack of wind. Many thanks to Daniel and James for setting a good course (with advice from Chris Phillips) and looking aft...