SOUTHERN CAPE NEWS - With several of our sailors away sailing a regatta at Hermanus, coupled with the rain on Sunday morning, February 5, conditions did not look good for sailing at George Lakes Yacht Club.
After the rain cleared up, Island Lake was windless. Nevertheless, some keen members pitched up and in the afternoon, a light southeasterly filled in. Six Lasers, a Sonnet and three Hobie14s sailed three races. This is the largest number of Hobies racing at GLYC for many years – they were Hans Delport, Michael Colyn and Hans Hefer.
The sailors organised their own start at Caravan mark, doing a gate start. A figure of eight course was sailed, using the fixed marks and finishing at the club jetty. Charles Norman (Laser) had a good set of races, holding the lead in each, but was passed by the similar boat of John Mark Olivier. Behind were Henry Paine, Bill Turner and Malcolm Osborne.
Among the Hobies, Delport had the lead in the first two races, but in the third race, it was Colyn getting ahead near the finish line on his Hobie 14 Turbo.
At stake was the Woodwise Trophy. The series of races for this trophy is scored on skipper handicap. On this basis, the winner of the first race was Tony Bowen (Laser). Norman won race two and Dave Jones (Sonnet single-handed) won race three. Including the two races sailed for this trophy in November, the overall winner is Norman, ahead of Turner and Osborne.
At the Southern Charter Classic regatta held at Hermanus Yacht Club, some classes sailed three races and others four races in strong wind on Saturday. On Sunday, conditions were completely different – very light wind. Two races were sailed in these conditions.
In the five-boat Fireball fleet, national champions Georgiou Divaris and Ferdinand Holm cleaned up, winning five races, ahead of Ant and Di Parker, and David Laing and Chris du Toit. In the 13-boat Dabchick fleet, Chris Kennedy secured second place, with Matthew de Villiers seventh and Britney Marques ninth.
In the Hobie 16 fleet the winners were Knysna Yacht Club's William and Lucinda Edwards. JP Kriel was first in the Laser 4.7 class, with Lameck Jason third. Megan Robertson got fifth in the Laser Radial fleet. In the mixed open two fleet, sailing their 29er, in first place were Mossel Bay Yacht and Boat Club’s Tammy Holden and Lea Smit.
* Info: www.glyc.org.za
