What a great opening weekend to the 2017 season, blue skies, some wind, plenty of boats and a great atmosphere - an excellent start!

As previously reported, there have been a lot of preparations going on off the water over the winter months and we are all hugely indebted to Mick and all of his helpers.

The working party and dinghy park clean set for April 1 was not an April Fool’s line, but one of the best attended working parties for some time. As the New Year’s Day Swim posters are looking for a ‘bigger beach,’ we were almost looking for a bigger dinghy park to accommodate the hordes who turned up from all sections of the club perhaps lured in by the offer of bacon butties.

Luckily, Keith was on hand to sort us all out and groups of three or four were allocated to different sections with brushes, shovels and hosepipes. Apparently, he even organised the heavy downpour which helped to wash away years of sand and mud.

At the end of the morning, the dinghy park was unrecognisable and all gratefully adjourned for the excellent tea and bacon and egg butties which were very welcome.

The following day saw our first two races of the year with keen competitors gather ing in the dinghy park form about 9 am (still early for some of us) with a light wind, but more importantly sunshine and blue skies. The fleet limped/paddled out wondering if it was going to be worth the effort, but luckily Dave ‘the wind God’ Plester was in the hut assisted by Clare and they conjured up a nice breeze to set the fantastic fleet of 13 boats on their way on a Monkstone Amroth Harbour course.

Jo Musson was making her first outing in Saundersfoot waters in her new toy, a very sporty looking RS 100 and proceeded to show us all the way round, closely followed by Maurice and Simon in their Contenders, plus Paul and Julia in the RS 200, while the rest of the fleet including a pack of five Lasers led round by Ben and Rosie, including a newcomer to the club Steve in his own Laser - welcome Steve, we hope you will enjoy it here.

The light breeze stayed fairly constant and at the end of three laps for the first few and two laps for others the final results saw those light air specialists Paul and Julia taking first place ahead of Ben and then Jo in her first outing in the 100, with Simon finishing fourth and Rosie an excellent fifth place.

For the second race, the course was reversed after consultation between Dave and Keith on safety. This seemed to be even more to the liking of Paul and Julia in the 200 who led virtually from the start to take their second victory of the day followed again by Ben and Jo despite a few close calls for Jo as the wind increased slightly, while just behind them this time Rosie came in fourth ahead of Simon.

All in all, a great start to the season in lovely spring-like conditions. Great to see so many competitors out there plus a few new faces both in the sailing fleet and the safety fleet.

As usual, a big thank you to all of those on duty with Dave and Clare in the Hut, Tom Eyre and new safety recruit Frank in the one safety with the ‘Aberdare Three’ led by Keith in the second safety boat.

This coming weekend, we have two more races planned starting at 1630, with Keith and Alan in charge, plus Terry and Martin providing plenty of experience on safety with Mark and Trish on hand in the second boat.

Dizzy Rascal