Saundersfoot Regatta

Saundersfoot Regatta over the long August Bank Holiday weekend was a great success although limited by the weather on the Monday as were so many holiday activities. The event was planned and operated by Saundersfoot Sailing Club and helped to raise funds for the RNLI, welcomed the public to clubhouse events, provided entertaining fun for holiday makers, attracted visitors to Saundersfoot to participate and offered some excellent and novel kayaking and sailing opportunities for visiting sailors as well as members. It is hoped that this was a successful and attractive community project - any comments or suggestions would be welcomed - [email protected]">[email protected].

Regatta Saturday

Despite the formidable forecast of force 5 wind, the day turned out to be a great sailing opportunity with a good west north westerly breeze, reasonable sea state and even a fair showing of sun. Sadly, only six boats took advantage of the opportunity but those that did enjoyed two good races as scheduled in the Regatta programme. John and Rolfe set a Pendine, Monkstone, harbour course which gave a good beat back to the harbour, with Huw, Chris and Graham on patrol. The fleet comprised a visiting RS700, a Fireball, a Phantom, a Laser 2000, a Solo and a Topper which gave a handicap range from 850 to 1301. After a clean and competitive start, the boats spread out across the course as their handicaps would suggest and there was no guessing the finishing order. After the calculator had done its work, visitor John Heissig (RS700) took the win by a short head from Debbie and Mark (Fireball), Peter Bower (Phantom) came third only a whisker behind with David Plester (Solo) fourth again only a few seconds after the Phantom.

More of the same followed in the second race with some increase in wind at times, but nothing like the promised blow. The Topper was given the option to sail a second lap after half an hour, but decided to finish at that point with a single lap, whilst the other boats all completed three circuits. John repeated his win still by a narrow margin, this time ahead of David with Peter maintaining third position and Mark and Debbie making fourth.

A satisfying morning of sailing was followed by a fun afternoon on the beach with a progression of kayak races organised by members Mick and Judy and their team. These were a great success and hotly contested with much friendly rivalry among the teams. Entrants were all ages and abilities which made for some interesting and exciting races. Falling in the sea at change-over seemed to be a particularly popular part of the race! Several races were run and in the end a satisfying draw was declared with no overall winner.

A spirit of good natured competition prevailed throughout!

At the top of the beach, there was an area of even more intense activity with a mass of young children digging feverishly for buried treasure and securing numerous rewards. After two hours, a couple of more cunningly buried treasures had still not been found, stimulating a mass communal effort like a pack of truffle hounds with ultimate success and a very deep hole! It was great to see so many children totally involved and entertained.

In contrast, there were building rather than digging activities all over the beach for the sandcastle competition which attracted a large number of entries and ranged from the traditional to the innovative in design and tools used to create them. Buckets and spades were the tools of choice for the majority but stones, coffee cups and plastic beer glasses were used by some enterprising competitors. Robyn, the Saundersfoot lifeguard, had a hard job choosing the winners from among so many excellent entries. Overall winners were the group of children and their friends from Ystradmynach Primary School with their fantastic creation complete with drawbridge, moat and portcullis. Runners up with their very modern take on the traditional castle were Sam and Rosie from Chester. Well done to all who took part. It really was a difficult choice as everyone worked so hard with their creations so all castle makers were awarded sweets as a consolation prize.

RNLI Brew

for the Crew

During the afternoon, the Saundersfoot RNLI ladies provided a magnificent spread of cakes and tea in the clubhouse for all comers in aid of RNLI funds.

Regatta

Relaxation

In the evening suitably refreshed by the buffet prepared by Jackie and her galley team, a full clubhouse was superbly entertained by the Terrific Trio of John, Maurice and Huw on guitars, drums plus harmonica and kazoo. Saundersfoot truly has got talent! A medley of hits from the decades kept the club rocking all evening and as the beer flowed the backing vocalists in the club got stronger. The Doombar real ale might well have been renamed Boombar. Great job guys!

A Real Bank

Holiday Sunday

The regatta continued in proper summer Bank Holiday weather on the Sunday with a novel pursuit race on the water in which seventeen boats took part. The principle of a pursuit is to sail around a fixed course for a set period of time - in this case 60 minutes. The slowest class of boat starts before all the others which are delayed by a number of minutes calculated from their respective handicap number, with the fastest boats therefore setting off last. The result is simple - whoever is leading after 60 minutes wins! It certainly kept the committee boat on its toes in order to set each class of boat off at the correct delayed time! Thanks to the Griffiths team on committee boat Sherpa Mor who managed it all so efficiently and to Huw and Graham on patrol keeping vigilance and urging everybody on.

The sailors clearly enjoyed the novelty of the race and everybody had a clear objective as they could see exactly who was in front of them and who they had to overtake - apart from the leader who just had to keep ahead! The golden sands of Saundersfoot were thick with happy holiday makers who could all view the action round the marks and for once work out who was leading and who was catching up.

Two Toppers started first and one held a good lead ahead of the next class - the Solos - right round the first lap of the course. Unfortunately, at this point 'on the beat' (tacking up wind) he somehow lost the plot and thus the lead. Two of the Solos then held onto their leading position despite the best efforts of the faster boats coming up from behind with spinnakers flying and every ounce of speed squeezed out of their craft. We were delighted to have two Tenby crews in their Ospreys visiting from Tenby SC who took the honours to set off last, exactly 21 minutes after the Toppers, as the lowest handicap (fastest) boats competing. Had the wind increased a little more they would have caught the leaders and there would have been quite a melee of different boats fighting it out at the finishing time.

The final results were: 1. David Plester (Solo); 2. Paul Johnson (Solo); 3. Peter Bower (Phantom); 4. Gordon and Ruth Evans (Fireball).

A second conventional race followed using a Monkstone, Amroth, harbour course which provided a more testing leg against the wind ('beat') back from the Amroth mark. This was won by Gordon and Ruth Evans (Fireball), with Ted Lewis and Mat Goldwait (TSC Osprey) second, Peter Bower (Phantom) third and Paul and Julia Griffiths sailing together for the first time in their new RS200 coming fourth.

It was a really good regatta sailing day and culminated in a few members with enough stamina returning to the bar in the evening for a quiet reminisce and a chat.

Two Out of Three Ain't Bad

Meatloaf's lyric 'Two out of Three Ain't Bad' proved the case for Regatta Monday, when force 5-6 winds swept in giving a really wet and miserable day and racing was sadly but prudently cancelled. Sailors and holidaymakers had to make the best of it and we finished the regatta jollities with a quieter social evening with food and refreshment on offer in the club.

Thank you

A big thank you to all the helpers and to all members, visitors and holidaymakers who took part over the long weekend.

Evening Sailing

Today (Friday), there is a fun evening sail at 5 pm - the forecast (for what that is worth) looks promising!

Sunday Racing

The next club racing starts at 6 pm this Sunday.

Skipper's Mate