13^th October 2013

Sunday 13^th October was a pretty miserable day.  Rain was forecast for most of the period of racing and the wind was predicted at about 13 mph.  The forecast delivered and the competitors got fairly wet while the spectators did their best to have a good view of the racing while staying relatively dry.

The inclement weather meant that your correspondent's hands were wet and cold.  He didn't notice that one of his fingers had managed to change his camera's settings to underexpose some of his pictures.  Hopefully PhotoScape has managed to retrieve the situation.

The main interest of the day was when Andrew managed to capsize when well in front of Stewart.  The shore based sailors were urging him to right his boat and to keep his lead.  Unfortunately it was not to be.

There was a discussion after the race about kicker tension.  Andrew and Sue might like to examine the pictures below and consider whether their mainsails look 100% efficient.

As usual, all comments are welcome. 

10 Day Weather Forecast for Milton-under-Wychwood

The 27^th October will be remembered by most as the day before the St Jude's Storm of 2013.  The weather forecast promised fairly strong winds (this is a technical meteorogical term) and the odd shower.

In the event the first race was held in windy, but largely sunny conditions.  There was plenty of action as my pictures will attest.  Those who swam, quite often did it more than once.

The main feature of the second race was that Les, crewed by Claire, was the only competitor in the Fast class.  For the first time in his life, and quite possibly the last, Les won the race by leading from start to finish.  As far as Ben is concerned the main event in race 2 was when Richard managed to put a huge hole in the port side of his hull.  Richard was using Caroline's boat as he had already broken his own earlier.

The last race was memorable for the violent showers which soaked half the competitors and most of the spectators, but seemed to leave those sailing at the far end of the lake largely unscathed.  Ben patched up the hole in his boat with gaffer tape and competed in the last race.  One helpful person on the deck pointed out that if Ben had used black tape, the hole would have been invisible.  Nice try, Richard!

My contribution would be incomplete if I did not mention that the Commodore was spotted swimming in the swimming area.  As far as we could see, this was entirely of her own accord.  Personally, I think that she must have had a bump on the head.