Saundersfoot Sailing Club held their annual Coppet Week regatta last week and yet again it proved to be a roaring success with the colourful fleet of 75 boats from all round the country providing a magnificent spectacle on the water and bringing in the regular influx of hungry and thirsty sailors to all the local pubs, cafes and restaurants.

The week got underway on Saturday, May 27, with the commodore’s welcome and race briefing carried out by Keith in the packed clubhouse and it was great to see many familiar returning faces plus a smattering of new faces as well.

The first full day on Sunday saw a lovely sunny day, but no wind so a very gentle start to the week. Luckily, the wind soon returned and the race team of Alan, John and Keith, assisted by other local helms, did a superb job and managed to fit in all five races for the main series by the end of Thursday. After a very competitive series of races, the overall winners were popular long-term visitors Ian and Ben Fryatt in a RS Vision ahead of the ex-Fireball World Champion DJ Edwards now sailing the mercurial National 12, with another popular visitor Chris Martin taking third place (and first in the Fast fleet) in his shiny new Merlin Rocket.

The fleet of 75 included 15 local SSC boats, plus three from Tenby SC, with the SSC boats enjoying the chance to race against both each other and all of the highly-skilled visitors with the hotly-contested battle for first local raging between Dave Plester, James Hayden and Paul/Julia finally seeing Dave take this prize, plus the class prize for being the first Solo with other class prizes going to Matt Smith and George Crabtree (Fireball), Ben Eaves (Supernova), Mike and Marty Whittaker (GP14), Phil and Jamie Mason (RS 400), Ross Ferguson (Topper), with Oscar and Lisa Chess being the first Osprey.

Prior to the prize-giving, the club were delighted to present a cheque for £375 to the RNLI from funds raised and then the annual raffle supported by St. Bride’s Spa Hotel was drawn to provide the three lucky winners with the excellent prizes provided by Andrew and Lindsay from St. Brides.

The prize-giving on Thursday was again to a packed house and the overall winner Ian repeated the thanks of Martin and Keith to all those club members who have helped to make this such as success both on and off the water where the team of Nina, John, Martin and Alison, plus others ensured all were kept fed and watered.

To round off the week on the Friday, there was a more informal pursuit race run off the beach in a very gentle and variable wind which saw a lot of gathering on the start line where the whole fleet chased the smaller boats, including the Toppers and normal Phantom sailor James, this time sailing the Gull with young son Harry. The slower boats were eventually overhauled by the bigger boats with the overall winner being the last boats off in the form of Oscar and Lisa Chess in their Osprey, just ahead of Peter and Igor from Tenby in a Scorpion, then Richard (Dicky) Dee in a Merlin rocket with crew Nancy.

This is a great fun way to round off what is a real family week both on and off the water which has helped to make it such a popular week and perhaps why so many return year after year.

As mentioned above, we cannot thank enough all of the club members who have put in so much work both before and during the week to ensure that everything ran smoothly and plans are already underway to make sure that next year’s event is at least as good and if possible even better. We are all having a welcome week off, but club sailing will resume on Sunday (June 11) at1830 on what will hopefully be a lovely summer’s evening.

Dizzy Rascal