Laser SB3 Inland Championship 22-24th April, Rutland Sailing Club

Held in what the winner called the “August sun “ and heat over the 3 days of Easter(!), the Inland Championship  held at Rutland Sailing Club proved highly competitive , with no clear winner until the last race.  And each race was won by a different boat.

Good Friday and 24 degrees C – who would have believed it?  For those racing, and not sunbathing, in the 6 knot wind the PRO shifted the course for each race.  Race 1 had to be re-started, as the wind swung 90 degrees up the first beat, so letting the late or barging starters off the hook.  Scots Ross Lang, Dan Challis and Matt Thomas, racing in their first SB3 event, then won the race, and they held the overall lead throughout the weekend until the last race!

The day’s challenge was to spot where the pressure would be coming from, with a few strong gusts and many shifts thrown in for interest.  In race 2 Dave Atkinson featured notably, but sadly unsuccessfully.  Having returned to SB3 racing by buying back his old boat “Kit Off” the previous afternoon, he led on the short upwind leg to the finish and full-bloodily tried to carry his kite to the line, only to fail in the last boat length and fall back to 5th.  The Huttons – Richard Wharam, Nick Wright and Ed – took the win, but then managed to be OCS in the next race, which was won by another Scots boat helmed by Doug Paton.

Saturday proved to be hot and windless, with the boats left lying alongside the brand new extended Rutland Club pontoons, which the SB3s had christened.   But in the late afternoon plans to cycle around the Water were interrupted by PRO Chris Wright attempting to catch the usual sea breeze from the Wash, but it failed to materialise.  Chris said that as a PRO at many years of major events he had never before lost a day’s racing.  But the SB3s had had 3 races for a Championship, while other major weekend regattas had not yet raced in 2 days! 

That night there was a fleet dinner, lubricated by free wine generously donated by David Atkinson.

Sunday brought steady 10 knots of cooler N breeze.  Callum Calder’s Young Pretender won the shortened 4th race so that now every Scot had won a race.  In race 5 Peter Saxton’s Rola-Trac alone headed along the leeward shore in pressure and a lifting starboard tack, to win by 400 metres – the biggest winning margin of the weekend.  Behind him Charlie Whelan in Here Comes Bod was one from the back as he started the final lap, but climbed up, covered and overhauled 4 boats after a quick early gybe, and finished in 5th place. 

All came down to the last (6th) race – could it be Ross Lang, or Charlie or Peter, or 2 – 3 others?  With a lighter and warmer breeze Charlie overhauled Dave Atkinson, and held off Peter Saxton by a boat’s length to win the Championship with his crewmen Richard Hall and Richard McAdam.

Coming up from the Solent Charlie said it had been a fantastic weekend in every respect, sailing and socially, racing against people with such good spirit many of whom he had never met before.  Thanks go to MarineGlaze, Crew Fuel and Gill for the prizes.

Results

Richard Triffitt

Courtesy of Sail-World.com

Over the years one of the great pleasures for Australians has been to beat their British rivals at their own game, be it cricket, rugby or tennis. Now the pressure is on the Brits in one of their favourite sports – sailing.

The SB3 dinghy is a particularly British Class. Designed in 2002 by British naval architect Tony Castro, most of the 600 boats in the World are being sailed in England and Ireland. Up to now every World Champion in the class has been British.

But now an Aussie Dream Team is aiming to beat the Brits in their own class at the upcoming World Championships in Torquay, England in May 2011.

And there is hot news today from the SB3 Australian Championship, being as part of Sail Port Stephens 2011.

Double 49er World Champion and Moth World Champion and Olympian Nathan Outteridge will now be sailing the upcoming World Championship in Torquay with fellow Olympian and current ISAF Sailor of the Year Tom Slingsby.

Triple Laser World Champion and Etchells World Champion Slingsby steps in for Dave Cheyne, who is the SB3 World Class President, after he hurt his shoulder. Outteridge, Brown and Cheyne had signalled their intentions with back to back wins at Audi King of Docklands and Audi Victoria Week, back in January.

Tom Slingsby was ‘press-ganged’ and agreed to sail as bow with Nathan and Olympic 470 medallist and coach Ian Brown only in the last few days.

The Olympians schedules are tight but the SB3 Worlds just squeeze in before the Holland Regatta.

With Tom Slingsby currently in Europe, today Nathan had his 21 year old younger brother Beau, who incidentally was making his SB3 sailing debut, on the team. Beau has been teaching sailing in the US for the last couple of years.

After the first race Nathan laughed, ‘Some things never change. Half way up the first leg, my kid brother was telling me what to do.’

‘Dave Cheyne is going to sail the SB3 Pre-Worlds with Brownie and I, then Tom will step in for the Worlds, after an RC44 regatta in Austria. The team’s first outing together will be on the first day of the Worlds.’

Fellow SB3 sailor and rival for the Australian and World championships, three times Laser Class World Champion and triple Cowes Week SB3 and also European SB3 winner Glenn Bourke feels Australia has a really good chance of claiming the SB3 World title and that both he and Nathan ‘will be giving it their very best shot.’

The SB3 fleet contested four races on Salamander Bay on day 1 of the SB3 Australian Championship.

Nathan Outteridge (One Design Sailing) finished race 1 in first place, 38 seconds ahead of Glenn Bourke (Club Marine White) with Stephen Fries (Wysiwyg-V) a further forty six seconds back.

In Race 2 Bourke reversed places with Outteridge. Mark Wolfenden (Still Out of Control) was third.

In Race 3 it was Outteridge, Bourke and Wolfenden.

Race 4 also belonged to Outteridge from Bourke with Mike McLean (Wagop) third.

Overall Series leader after day 1 is Nathan Outteridge (1,2,1,1) from Glenn Bourke (2,1,2,2) and Mark Wolfenden (7,3,3,5).

The training weekend, March 26-27th at Muiderzand was a great succes for the Dutch and Belgian SB3 class. With 7 boats on the water and 2 spare crew we had a perfect group of sailors that made the most out of the tips and tricks offered by South-African, Roger Hudson.

Saturday morning started with the rigging and tuning of the boats, and by mid day we were on the water with the fleet and the coaching RIB. It was cloudy and rather cold, but the NE-wind between 8 and 12 knots gave perfect conditions to run a lot of starting procedures and 4 short races. Roger filmed loads of interesting sequenses and gave his comments on the spot.

By the time the boats were safely moored, the footage was sorted. The group gathered over a beer in the lovely restaurant Voor Pampus, where we watched the sailing of the day. Comments were given and a list of things to improve the boatspeed, boathandling and mark roundings was gathered for all to work on the next day.

Sunday was a very sunny and much warmer day. We started with an overview of the rig on one boat. The SB3 sailors are good listeners which gave Roger the opportunity to go over all the boathandling and emphasise what is most important to work at with the crew and the details that change in different weather conditions. Just before mid day the fleet was on the water in light conditions. Again we started with 6 starting procedures, as the wind died away. It took less than half an hour for a fresh more Northerly wind to build, and now we had 10-12 knots to get some close racing going again.

It was very obvious that all sailors understood the little details to improve there sailing. The footage of the day with Roger’s comments showed this very clearly. We watched it after the very smooth hauling out of the boats. Some have had some personnal tips, tactics were improved, and in general it was stunning how much better the boats went around the courses on the second day. Everyone must have a good feeling about their starts now, and their boats certainly have less secrets.

Roger & Frank really enjoyed this group of sailors that put such a great effort in the listeneing and trying out the tips they received. They hope that all will benefit from this, and that everyone keeps working on the details with the great attitude they saw the whole weekend. We all must thank Claire and Martijn from the Dutch SB“-class for their effort as well as the warm welcome we had at Marina Muiderzand.

All 475 pics are available at www.races.sb3class.be The video footage will be available to the 7 boats that participated.

Frank Dobbels

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SB3 sailors and golfers are invited to an International Sail-Golf weekend, to be held between 29 April and 1 May near Ancona, on the Adriatic coast: at NUMANA, Italy for the regatta, and nearby at SIROLO for the golf competition.
 
The event is organised by Yacht Club Riviera del Conero and Concero Golf Club.
 
Teams are to be composed of 2 golfers and 2 sailors, sailing together for the days dedicated to sailing (using ISAF regatta rules). The same sail-golf team will play the golf matches (according to Louisiana rules) on Conero Golf Club.
 
Entry fee is EUR 150, which includes the rental of a Laser SB3, green fees and the golf competition fee.

The organising committee proposes a package of 3 nights in a 3 star hotel for a double room including breakfast, competition fees, and airport transfers for EUR 350 (single supplement an additional EUR 20).
 
For more information, contact Vincenzo Graciotti 0039 348 2260 375 (Mob.) or 0039 071 7360 613

Conero SB3-Golf weekend