The Etchells Invitational Regatta for the RTYC Gertrude Cup

15/10/2018

Royal London Yacht Club
Royal London Yacht Club - Younger Members
Cowes Etchells Fleet

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13/08/2018

17/07/2018

Your winners of the 2018 Royal Thames Yacht Club The Etchells Invitational Regatta for the Gertrude Cup the team team from Royal London Yacht Club

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17/07/2018

Day 3 Report

Day 3 was again postponed awaiting the sea breeze and yet again today PRO Phil Hagen again called the timing correctly. As the boats prepared to be towed to the race course an 8-10 kt SW materialised that increased to 14-16 kts in time for the first start.

Racing got underway at 12.40 with the course laid between the Hillhead buoy and the Bramble post in a strong flood tide keeping the boats slightly back from the line, with sails 4 and 7 the most advanced and at the pin slightly back but in clean air was sail 10, Greig City Academy. Sail 7 US Youth team Blue (Sean Cornell, Chris Manson-Hing, Rachel Daye and Scott Ewing) who started well at the committee boat end holding a high lane on starboard that moved them into the lead, ahead of sail 2 Royal Sydney Yacht Club’s Doug Flynn who at the mark sailed slightly beyond the starboard lay-line being wary of a late tack in tide potentially catching them out at this buoy. This allowed sail 4 series leader Mark Lees in at the top mark. The tide did however catch out three boats who needed to do late tacks to round and one had to gybe. At the spreader mark an incident between sails 9 Royal Perth Yacht Club, Pat Voss and sail 3 Cowes Corinthian,Kim Ridge resulting in sail 9 retiring for the day with damage - which luckily can be fixed overnight - and sail 3 retiring from the race. On the downwind leg sail 10 Greig City Academy showed great speed. This took them into second for the race behind winner Sean Cornell, sail 7 and Doug Flynn sail 2 came in third.

Second race of the day sail 10, Montel Fagan-Jordan took his now reserved spot at the pin for the start and leading up the first beat he didn’t tack until on lay line. They led at the windward mark and again at the leeward but one of the sail 10’s crew missed his hiking line. Luckily he was recovered quickly by their tactician Matt Reid, pulling the wayward crew out of the water as he nearly passed the stern but this put sail 10 back into 3rd place behind sail 7 (Sean Cornell) and sail 2 (Doug Flynn). After the next top mark rounding, leading sail 7 gybed early followed latterly by sail 10, who managed to position their boat between 2 and 7 in clear breeze, and at the finish the three were overlapped, but in the revised order 10, 7, 2.

For race 3 the tide had turned and built throughout the race giving great over the ground upwind speeds and the opportunity for pumping and working the boat downwind. Again it was sail 10 who won the pin, but with sail 6 Connor Needham a few boat lengths to windward also having a great start heading hard left. Three-quarters of the way up the beat sail 10 tacked and just crossed sail 17 to lead at the top mark. This was a lead that sail 10 Montel Fagan-Jordan was to hold throughout the race to take day 3’s Boat of the Day top spot. Matt Reid sail 10’s tactician and coach was after racing full of praise for how hard his young lads are working their boat.

Series leader sail 4 Royal London YC (Mark Lees) retired today at the start of race 2 with gear failure luckily now 2 discards have kicked in it means they are still leading, but with the hope of the Jury awarding them average points their lead may increase further.

See https://yachtscoring.com/event_results_cumulative.cfm?eID=4658 for the results so far

Rob Goddard

Results Images

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17/07/2018

The final day of the Royal Thames Yacht Club The Etchells Invitational Regatta for the Gertrude Cup 2018 and its all to play for.

©Sportography.tv

16/07/2018

Day two Report

Despite high pressure dominating the weather over the Solent, and with very little breeze in the forecast PRO Phil Hagen sent the fleet out under tow to the north shore near Hillhead. As he predicted at 0900 that morning, at 1300 the sea breeze from the southwest started to form and at 1320 with 8kts of breeze, race one of the day was underway for a fantastic days sailing.

Today’s race one saw the whole fleet start cleanly with sail 9, Royal Perth Yacht club (Pat Voss, Adam Negriand Cameron Seagreen) having the best mid-line start while sail 10, Greig City Academy won the pin after fending off a strong challenge from sail 6, the all-female crew (Annabel Vose, Suzy Russell, Hannah Peters and Charlotte Heijstek.) Again, clear air at the pin worked for Grieg City’s bow forward speed mode and they rounded the top mark four boat lengths ahead of sail 6 who were closely followed by sail 4 Mark Lees and the Royal London team. Unfortunately, at the top mark sail 10, Greig City Academy bore away to fight the tide on starboard, allowing the chasing pack to gybe before them, handing the lead over to sail 9, Royal Perth Yacht club. It was to be a lead they comfortably held to the finish line with Annabel Vose edging out Mark Lees to finish second.

Second race of the day saw again, sail 10 Greig City Academy fighting for the pin. However when individual recall was sounded they unnecessarily handed their strong position to sail 4 Royal London Yacht Club as the only two boats that were over were sails 3, Cowes Corinthian Yacht club ( Kim Ridge, James Downer and Andrew Dog Palfrey) and the previous race winners sail 9, Royal Perth Yacht club.

At the top mark it was sail 6 US Youth Team Red (Connor Needham, Jim Kennedy, Franny Schulte and Brooks Daley) who led from Mark Lees sail 4, but on the downwind leg an early gybe into weaker tide by sail 1, GBR/USA Youth team (Ted Blowers, Will Birch-Tomlinson, Edward Lebens and Patrick Braythan) managed to separate the two front runners, giving Ted Blowers second position and his first podium place of the series, behind Connor Needham’s sail 6.

In a now building sea breeze, that saw winds of 14kts average with a few gusts of 18 kts registered on the Bramble post (the site of that early morning’s low tide cricket match.) Race 3 was delayed due to gear problems on sail 10, but this did not stop Montel Fagan - Jordan from again winning the pin. However at the top mark it was Connor Needham in sail 6 who arrived first but with the wind pressure changes there was a certain amount of the pack being shuffled on the downwind leg. A big gainer was Ted Blowers in sail 1 who now moved through the fleet into 3rd position taking the left hand gate mark. As Blowers used the knowledge learnt on the previous race - and also on this race’s first downwind leg - he again gybed early and sailed to victory.

Large spring tides can have some strange effects in places, and today it happened at Hillhead for race 4. Just before the start, the committee boat swung totally on the breeze as if there was no tidal flow, and there was none in this area. Unfortunately the King Pins in Bow ten hadn’t spotted this and the Greig City team couldn’t lay the pin so had to gybe round and start behind the fleet. Not quite on the pin but close to it with good speed was Cowes Corinthian Yacht Club sail 3 (Kim Ridge, James Downer and Andrew Dog Palfrey.) Very soon they had a slender lead on Connor Needham’s sail 6, a lead that Kim Ridge held to the top mark then extended it through the race. Sail 2 Royal Sydney Yacht Club (Doug Flynn, Alex Flynn and David Bedford) made a late charge into second placewith the top performing boat of the day, Ted Blowerssail 1 taking his third consecutive podium.
Mark Lees and the Royal London Yacht Club still lead overall on 13 points, with Ted Blowers and the combined GBR/US Youth team in second on 18 Points and are leading the Corinthian results from Connor Needham USA Youth Team Red on 21.

Rob Goddard

16/07/2018

📸 Patrick Condy

15/07/2018

Your Gertrude photographers for 2018 will be out on the water tomorrow capturing the final two days of the The Etchells invitational regatta for the Gertrude Cup, with glorious drone images, photos and video shot from the guys at Sportography.TV On there Rib

15/07/2018

With day 2 of racing done with a beautiful sea breeze that filled in the crews experienced some classic but excellent Solent conditions have a look at the action below.

Hannah Peters Annabel Vose Arran Holman Fraser Woodley Will Bedford Ted Blowers Patrick Bray Freya Anderson Montel Fagan - Jordan Jon Holt

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14/07/2018

After the south east sea breeze failed to materialise, Royal Thames Race Officer Phil Hagen had the mark laying ribs set the race course ready for the eventual south westerly winds’ arrival, which by 15.20 BST a 6 -8 Knot had just appeared. However with a strong ebb tide, a fair course was always going to be difficult, the Race Committee managed to achieve it though with all boats having to gybe frequently on all of the downwind legs.
At the first start, the Committee Boat was slightly favoured and with tide pushing boats over the line, two boats were called back for OCS, but it was the boats that started at the pin and continued on starboard who arrived at the top mark first, led by the Royal London Youth Team skippered by Will Bedford, today helmed by Mark Lees, leading from sail 7 (the US Youth Blue team sailed by Sean Cornell.) However sail 7 was the first to gybe on port and find extra pressure and into first place, and this was a lead that Sean Cornell held to the finish.
In race two the tide had just started to flood which caught most competitors out as the tide switch was quite quick and the fleet was about half a boat length line shy. For the first leg, there appeared to be little to choose between the two sides of the course with the Greig City Academy team helmed by Montel Fagan-Jordan heading right on to port and Will Bedford’s team continuing on Starboard, and at the cross three-quarters of the way up the beat Bedford’s team led by barely a couple of boat lengths. This lead quickly grew though as they spotted that the spreader mark had now become the true windward mark and made early allowance for it, whilst nearly all of the following pack didn’t and many struggled to lay it. In fact in the mayhem that pursued, three boats were seen to take penalty turns increasing Bedford’s lead further, a lead that he carried to the finish where his Royal London team won by nearly a minute and a half.
At the end of day one, the overall leader is sail 4 (the Royal London team of William Bedford, Fraser Woodley, Arran Holeman and Mark Lees) followed by the winners of race one, sail 7 the US Youth Blue team (sailed by Sean Cornell, Chris Manson-Hing, Rachel Daye and Scott Ewing), with The Greig City Academy sail 10 in third place (sailed by Montel Fagan-Jordan, Shabazz Patterson, Matt Reid and Andy Caicedo).

Rob Goddard