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Optimists
at Datchet SC
(NOT the Papercourt Open)On
Saturday, 12 January, the Papercourt Optimist Open was to have been held.
Although helpers broke up the ice on Friday,
it refroze overnight to greet the visitors on Saturday morning.
All attempts to make the lake sailable on Saturday morning failed,
leading to the cancellation of the Papercourt. Optimist Open. A few phone calls later and Datchet Water SC agreed to host an alternative event for those still working out what to do with the day. At 10:30 the Optimists left in convoy to the club who quickly organised rescue cover, a committee boat and a race officer who had only come up to discuss details of this year’s Optimist Inland Championships. Catering had the largest shock now having to deal with 70 additional persons for lunch. Everybody
chipped into the running of the event and 33 boats had their first race at
12:15. With a number of RYA zone
squads running training courses this weekend, the smaller than usual fleet was
missing the usual middle order sailors. National
squad and “regatta fleet” boats were keen to race in the first Open of 2002
with Wraysbury SC travelling with a number of youngsters, the youngest being 7. The
wind was force 2 – 3 and last years European boats Philip White (Papercourt)
and James Murdock (Bowmoor) were in close contention with Robyn Stock (Royal
Lymington), Hannah Diamond (Warsash) and Claire Lasko (Bowmoor).
After completing the trapezoidal course with an outer loop Murdock
crossed the line first with Stock second, Diamond third,
White 4th and Lasko 5th. A
short break for a warm lunch was followed by a race at 14:00 in a good force 3
-4. At the beginning of the second
beat White was comfortably in the lead followed by Murdock and Lasko.
On the final run and reach Murdock managed to get ahead and finish 1st
ahead of Lasko and White. Sophie
Wequelin (Royal Lymington) and Amelia Garnett (Papercourt) sailed a well
deserved 4th and 5th respectively. Race
3 was sailed back to back with Murdock making it a third straight win ahead of
Lasko. Diamond managed to stay
ahead of White to come 3rd with White 4th and Wequelin.5th. Prizes
were hastily provided by a parental whip round and generous donations by The
Dinghy Store (Datchet) and ACE Boats. Many
thanks must go to Datchet SC, Huw Pearce (rescue coordinator), Peter Shore (OOD)
and all the volunteers who enabled this alternative event to go ahead. Results:
1st (2pts) – James Murdock (Bowmoor SC), 2nd (1st
girl and 1st Junior) (4pts) – Claire Lasko (Bowmoor SC), 3rd (6pts) – Hannah Diamond (Warsash SC), 4th (7 pts)
– Philip White (Papercourt SC), 5th (9pts)– Sophie Wequelin
(Royal Lymington YC), 6th (12pts) – Ben Cripps (Papercourt SC), Youngest sailor – Christopher Taylor (Wraybury SC), 1st non squad boat – Robert Godwin (Hayling Island SC) |
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