Chichester Yacht Club Magazine April 2018 | Page 18

48 boats kick off Snowflake 2018
- by Mark Green
Despite the wet, cold weather 48 boats turned
out for the first of Chichester Yacht Club’s
In Race 2 Simon
Snowflake winter series.
and Eve won by a clear margin exploiting the
asymmetric RS400’s performance on the
The forecast strong winds had shifted to the
reaching course.
evening leaving a good F4 breeze which filled
in by the race start time of 1300. But with the The medium fleet had a particularly good turn-
wind forecast to shift direction Race officer
out of Solos, 2000s and Lasers, as well as a
Phil Allen set a figure of eight course aiming to strong fleet of the new lightweight single
be flexible if the wind shifted during the race.
handed RS Aero 7s.
At the start of the first race at least one Merlin
was over the line and had to double back.
The course took them on a beat from West to
East toward the Marina, before bearing away
on the first of a series of long reaches back to
the start line.
The wind around the headland proved tricky
with some of the competitors choosing to go
deeper into the channel to avoid the wind
holes.
Over the water Simon and Eve Townsend’s
RS400 from Emsworth SC finished first, but
their lead was not enough to beat Will and
Mary Henderson in their Merlin Rocket from
Itchenor SC after the times were adjusted for
Portsmouth Yardstick.
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In both races the front of the fleet was a battle
between Steve Cockerill and Mark Riddington
in their Aero 7s.
In both races Steve held Mark off by less than
10 seconds. In the Second race Sarah
Cockerill came in third to complete a 1,2,3 for
the Aerods.
The Slow fleet had a good squad of Toppers
and Laser 4.7s with first time visitor to CYC,
John Stokes, in his Optimist.
In the first race there was nothing to separate
the Mirror of Alice and Richard Bullock from
the Topper sailed by Alfie Lester, but after the
handicap was applied the Mirror won the race
by 25 seconds. In the second race Alfie
finished ahead but not by enough to overcome
the Mirror’s handicap.