RUTLAND CLASSIC
2007
Stenhouse tops 23 knots as he dominates
at the Rutland Classic
Rutland offered everything on Sunday 1st
July, sunshine, black clouds, heavy showers, clear skies,
and breeze from 10 to 25+ knots in the squalls. Entrants
from all over the Midlands meet at Rutland for the Rutland
Classic 4 hour pursuit race. In wind speeds averaging
15 knots, a race this length was likely to be a test
of fitness as well as skill.
With the water being competed for with
squad training and youth sailing, race office Nick Bett
made best use of the space available by fully utilising
the north arm of the reservoir. With the wind from the
SW this made for two long beam reaches between the two
towers, less than ideal skiff territory in such brisk
and gusty conditions.
Even with the local PY of 865, the Skiffs
had a full 3 hours of racing to which to look forward.
From the start Richard Stenhouse lead from Kit Stenhouse
and Tim Chapman. After a short beat and run Tim passed
Kit when she missed the second mark, but Tim returned
the favour when he capsized on the bare away after the
square reach across the front of the clubhouse. Both
then closed on Richard when he capsized on the gybe
to the first tower, but that was the last mistake Richard
made and he then pulled away, making light of the difficult
long beam reaches. Kit and Tim vied with each other
for the fifty minutes, when a spinnaker tangle allowed
Kit to get away, and fewer mistakes up the reaches opened
up the distances further.
Richard lapped all entries up to fifth
place to record a comfortable win, and in one squall
down wind on the short kite leg, recorded 23.4 knots
on his “Velocitec” gps. Kit passed all the boats in
front, but was caught by the shadow of Phil Neal (Rutland),
so took third. An exhausted Tim, threatening lawsuits
against the race officer for cruelty to the aged, failed
to catch the FF of commodore Nick Clark to finish fifth.
With a 1st, 3rd, and 5th, “Skifftastic”
easily won the team prize from last year’s winners Notts
County.
Many thanks go to Nick Bett and
the team for a well run event in testing conditions.
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