Dell Quay Sailing Club

(Published in the Chichester Observer on Thursday 22nd June 2017)

A force 5 wind blowing from the South West greeted a strong turnout of 25 contestants for the 2017 DQSC National Solo Open meeting. The first race was scheduled for noon but was slightly delayed.

For the first race the favoured start end was at the committee boat. This resulted in a general recall with all the competitors bunching up and arriving too early for the start. However, the next start was clean and the favoured side of the course was to the right, resulting in lots of short tacking against the tide. The visitors soon got into the swing of things, and there were a few ‘close calls’ as the fleet made its way to DQSC mark 1 in mid channel. First place went to Doug Latta (Porchester SC), closely followed by Ian McGregor (Salcombe YC), leaving Jonathan Otter (Papercourt SC) to take third place.

For race 2 the start line was port end biased this time, but that was in the tide. The local sailors, having got that wrong, went right to avoid the flood tide. Then there was a major shift to the left, which lifted those that started at the port end such that they immediately tacked and came out in front. This time Ian McGregor came in first, with Tim Jackson (Papercourt SC) second and Nick Marden (Bough Beech SC) third.

For the final race the tide was now on the ebb, with a port end biased start line causing quite a queue at that end. For the contestants it was a case of starting on starboard and then finding a gap to get back to port and into a ‘clear lane’ in the tide. Once again Ian McGregor took first place, followed by Ian Barnett (CYC) and Nick Marden once again in third place.

Ian McGregor’s two wins gave him his first 2017 Solo Open win, with Doug Latta and Tim Jackson placed second and third in the competition overall.

Report provided by Mark Harper

Photos by Becki Dicker

Little room left for manoeuvre around the leeward mark

Close racing on the reach towards the second DQSC mark