Camel Week 6-11 August 2000
Rock Sailing and Water Ski Club, Cornwall
This was my first trip to Rock SC. I arrived at 1830h Saturday evening and got directions to the 'boat park'. As it turned out, the SC has literally no space for boats and the 'crew' (the lads from Stokes Bay) had sorted out a fabulous location about quarter of a mile from the club. A small farm that had water frontage, plenty of space for boats and parking for the sum of £25 for the week.
Sunday was an early start, all races having to be run an hour either side of the mammoth 7m tide. A 0945h start meant crawling out of the tent at 0730h, a hasty breakfast and get down to the beach to rig the boat. No course had been posted with 40 mins to go to the start so we walked back to our boats and launched, planning to stop at the club to check the course on the way to the start. Conditions were not good, a very light NW F1~2. The entry was good, over 100 boats in total with 17 cats. The fabulous 5 (Unicorns) were:
William who has made a return to sailing after a few years off soon showed he had lost none of the skill that brought him national championships in 1994 and 1995. He was chased doggedly by Gary and Phil but held on to win by 56s from Gary and 1m54s from Phil. Bringing up the rear were me (5m22s behind) and Chris whose large frame was proving a real handicap in such light air (12m40s behind). The Unicorns held the first 4 positions on corrected time.
Monday was to prove to be more of the same weather wise but in a different format of a pursuit race. Wind was light F1~2 but with the occasional 2+. The Mirrors started first at 120mins and the Unicorns next to last at 67 mins (Hurricane 5.9 was last to go). The form book held with William leading the charge followed by Gary and Phil. Chris and I were tail end Charlie's with Chris getting in front when I went the wrong side of a mark and had to sail back round it. We were all rather mystified by the results (given the number of boats we had overtaken) as it gave William 30th, Gary 31st, Phil 42nd, Chris 55th and me 62nd. We all suspected some confusion on the number of laps completed. In the cat class the Unicorns again took the first 4 places.
Tuesday brought F1~2 yet again (frustrating……). The formbook remained the same, William leading followed closely by Gary with Phil just keeping touch. Chris and I were having fun with B14's, Laser 4000's, RS400/600's. The sting was in the tail of this race with William and Gary sailing into a hole in the wind. Phil saw their dilemma and gave the hole a wide berth. He split the pair and came within 4s of beating William across the line. Fate also befell me, sailing into the same hole (no I hadn't seen Gary and William) and then having the downhaul fitting snap. This allowed Chris to sail through for 4th place. Our uncorrected times were 1h21m2s, 1h21m6s, 1h22m20s, 1h30m48s, 1h33m31s. On this occasion the Unicorns took the top 5 cat positions.
Wednesday brought a real change. Another pursuit race but this time the wind was fresh, in fact very fresh. A good F5 with some gusts probably reaching 28kts. William had decided to take a lay day, Chris decide not to risk his boat in the melee with 100 others in the confines of the estuary and Gary snapped a batten rigging his boat and never made the start. That left Phil and I to prove the Unicorn is not just a fair weather boat, able to mix it with the Hobbies and Hurricanes in the rough stuff. It was pretty clear from the outset that Phil was on a mission, He had taken a 100m lead from me by the first mark and was already closing in on the Hobbies. I had problems with the rudders popping up (pulling the quick release open) and had to stop twice to reset them. By the time I got going again on the very exciting reach down the estuary, Phil was already on his way back down the course, out on the trapeze with a big grin on his face. I have to admit to sailing in survival mode (no trapezing on the reaches and dumping the main when the bows disappeared more than a foot under!!). I managed to limit myself to one major nosedive and just missed going up the beach when I was gybing round the mark for the last time. The mark was only 25m from the shore and just as I started to turn I was hit by a really strong gust, somewhat increasing my turning radius!! The estuary was a real sight, there were one or two cats and dozens of dinghies capsized every lap and a growing collection of retirements on the shore. When we finally finished and made it to shore I found that Phil had passed every boat to win the event and when the results were posted I found myself in 16th place (8th cat).
We couldn't believe it when Thursday brought a return of the doldrums, F1~2. William just showed there was no way anyone was going to beat him in these conditions and sailed another faultless race into 1st. This time Phil was starting to get a measure of the conditions and pushed William to finish 2m32s behind. Gary had a bad day (for him) and was even behind me on the odd occasion!! He finally finished in 3rd 3m38s down. I brought up 4th place overall 9m8s behind followed by Chris (Unicorns top 5 cats again).
The final day brought, you've guessed it, F1~2 (but at least the sun came out). No great surprises with William completing the clean sweep of light air races followed in by Phil Gary and I. Chris made the wise decision to sit out the last race which seemed to go on forever (2h duration at walking pace…….)
Provisional results for the Cat Class
Race No 1 2 3 4 5 6 Total Position
William 1 1 1 (19) 1 1 5 1
Phil (3) 3 2 1 2 2 10 2
Gary 2 2 3 (19) 3 3 13 3
John 4 7 5 (8) 4 4 24 4
Chris 6 4 4 (19) 5 19 38 5
So, an impressive result of 1st to 5th for the Unicorns in a fleet of 17 cats.
John Wade
1086 C'est la vie