Nearly 300 sailors and support crews attended the first BUSA event of the year, to be greeted by cold but gentle winds.
Saturday morning got underway slowly with the first start being postponed. As the racing began the wind was a steady force 2, which built during the day to a force 4 before dropping. Sunday?s weather was much of the same, which was forgiving for all the tired sailors after a late night socialising in Rendezvous.
Exeter University made a clean sweep in the laser fleet taking home all the medals. Nick Thompson beat fellow team mate Andrew Brooks by winning the last race, both having won two races and come second in two. In third place was last year?s winner Charles Bailey-Strong, who also won race 2.
Gemma Frier and Sophie Esson, newcomers to university sailing, convincingly won the Laser 2 fleet, by winning every race! They were closely followed by the two top Bath University boats, with Rob Shorrocks and Tim Riley taking 2nd place from Ant Harvey and Liz Carrell.
The Handicap fleet was dominated by Jim Eynon and Chris Downham from London University, sailing their Merlin Rocket, winning 3 out of the 5 races. The other races were won by Chris Catt and Phil Kennard from Warwick University, sailing their RS800 (2nd place overall), and by Andy Cornah and Orwin Murray from Southampton University, also sailing their RS800 (3rd Place overall). The rest of the top 10 included last year?s Laser 2 fleet champion Paul Smalley from Warwick sailing his RS600 [5th Place overall] and 420 French National Champion, Ally Martin, sailing with Eamonn King, from Southampton, taking 7th place overall.
The combined Lark and Firefly fleet had difficulties with the results, but they were finally resolved on Sunday morning! Leading the fleet in their Lark, Martin Harrison and Mike Young from Lancaster University, won 3 out of the 5 races. In 2nd place overall was Matt Findlay and Daniella Hanson from Southampton University, who also won a free entry into the Firefly National Championships next summer [kindly donated by the Firefly Class Association]. James Goodfellow and Samantha Evans from Plymouth University sailed consistently throughout the weekend to take 3rd place. Another good performance in the fleet was by David Millege and Jess Brown from Durham Univeristy who won the final race.
The team prize was won by Exeter for the second year in a row, with Bath coming second again.
This event wouldn?t have been possible without the help from all the support crew [including sailors from Cardiff and Bangor University] and race officials, plus W&PSA with their excellent new facilities. I?d also like to thank BUSA Sport for all their help in the running of this event.
The next BUSA events are taking place over coming few weeks, including the BUSA Match Racing qualifier 1 to be held on the 20/21st November at Queen Mary SC [See www.busa.co.uk for full details].
Results are on the calendar and photos in the photo library.
Jessica Mapplebeck