Puddleduck Vineyard Racing DF95 31/10/2023

[Shorty]

A strong fleet of 13 starters turned out for today’s DF95 racing at the vineyard. Searching through my records I think that this is the biggest fleet of 95’s that we have had in the last two years! The wind was a strong and quite gusty North-West to Westerly with over-powering gusts of up to 20 knots. Initially we all tried our A-rigs but after the second race some changed down to the B-rig. As the morning wore on light patches became more frequent and so those who did change down found themselves wanting at times.

Many skippers fell foul of the usual traps at Puddleduck. Buoy snares, the fountain, the café deck, and the shallow Western shore all claimed victims at times today and the rescue boat was employed on several occasions. Thanks to those who manned the dinghy in such tough conditions. Thanks also to Bruce Palmer who took on Race Officer duties today – absolutely needed when conditions are rough.

With the big fleet on the small pond, all overpowered in gusty conditions there was a fair bit of bumpety-bump going on which serves to remind us that we need to give bigger margins when conditions are rough, keep aware of basic rules and be ready to show an extra measure of forgiveness when needed.

Don McLeod had to retire early today with servo issues. Hope that you get your boat back together for our next race meet Don. Given the conditions, one boat down out of 13 was a pretty good return, and we had all boats finishing in 6 of the 10 races.

It was a warm welcome back today for ‘gadget-man’ Ron Cullen who has had a marathon 3-month overseas holiday.  Ron took a little while to find form again today but finished the day strongly after a slow start.

Fab Phil Watkins had a strong day finishing 4th overall, recording two race wins and what should have been a third. In race #4 Fab was well ahead but thought there was another lap to go and so he did not pass through the finishing gate. Trout, who was coming 4th at the last buoy, passed ‘Bloody’ Geoff who snared himself on the mark then me when I got in irons in a gust, and he headed straight to the finish line for victory while Fab was realizing his mistake!

Third overall today was Ian Hey who finished the day strongly with a win and two seconds in the last three races. (Although I think that some credit is due to Bruce Palmer who was at the helm for the race win!)

Trout took second with lots of ‘useful’ third places on his score sheet.

Today’s winner was Jammy Jones (again!) with super-consistent results given the rough conditions. In many of the races Jammy had to sail himself back into contention after early mis-adventure. Congratulations Jammy, Trout and Bodge.

Nick was away from the café (holiday) and so no fudge! But the coffee and chat was great as usual.

Shorty

[Gadget]

A great write up shorty and you captured the days events very well.

Thank you for the warm welcome back. Three months trecking through Europe was great but it’s also good to be back home.

Here is hat cam footage of race one from today. It’s very slow uploading the videos to YouTube so I’ll just pick some of the races at random to upload.

Race 1

[Gadget]

Hat cam footage from Race 3.

My boat is forced under the Puddleduck deck at the four minute mark but luckily it tacks and sails back out 🙂

[Gadget]

Hat cam footage Race 5:

[Gadget]

Hat cam footage Race 8:

[Author]

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