Reports
:: 505 Northvaal championships – Vaal Cruising Association, April 2008 :: (477 Reads)
Posted by
warwick
on Monday, May 12, 2008 - 09:16 PM
The results have been put up on the results page. There are also some cool photos courtesy of Rene', even the photo finish picture is there, have a look in the gallery! The weekend of the 26 – 28th of April started off well with a light south westerly wind filling in the bay just off the Vaal Cruising Association’s marina. Race 1 was started shortly after lunch with Hans and Alan winning followed by Tony and Dylan in second and Thomas and Peter in third. Racing was extremely close with Bronwen and CJ coming in 4th, followed by Mark and Colin, Kyle and Robert, Albrecht and Warwick and the newest members of the 505 class, Jay D’engle and Marco Mare. We would like to welcome you and hope that you will also enjoy this fast and exciting boat!
Race two and three indicated that there was still some tight and exciting racing to come. Thomas and Peter managed to pull off two first places followed closely by Kyle/Robert and Tony / Dylan and Albrecht / Warwick. There was very little distance between the finishers with various teams exchanging positions regularly. The final race of the day saw the BRT with Kyle / Robert winning from the Funke brothers while Bronwen / CJ scored a very well deserved third. The ‘in–form’ Tony was up there again in 4th with Hans and Alan coming in close behind him in 5th.
Cirrus clouds on Saturday evening had everyone hoping for some strong wind on Sunday, but this was not meant to be. The sailors and the race committee had a leisurely day waiting around for the wind that never came.
Monday dawned with a light southerly breeze. Racing got off to an early start with very tight battles throughout the fleet. The left hand side of the course seemed to be the most favourable but a gust from the right would change this from time to time. Race 5 was narrowly won by the Funkes, with Kyle / Robert coming second and Hans/Alan in third. Race 6 saw the breeze shift to the north and the committee was forced to shorten the course as the new breeze started to fill in. Kyle/Robert won the race, with Thomas/Peter in second and Tony/Dylan coming in 3rd. Bronwen scored another well deserved 4th just ahead of Hans/Alan with Mr consistency Mark Biagio with his new crew Colin finishing 6th. Race 7 was started in a good north westerly breeze of 10 – 12 knots. The Funkes were quick out of the starting blocks and led the fleet around the first mark with the rest of the fleet in close pursuit. A bunched up mark rounding at the leeward mark caused pulses to quicken but everyone seemed to be enjoying themselves. Albrecht and Warwick went on to win the race from Thomas and Peter after they sheared a spinnaker halyard on the triangle and were forced to make emergency repairs with Kyle and Robert finishing third, in what was described as a photo finish. Tony /Dylan showed good form coming in fourth with Browen and CJ in 5th. Mark and Colin finished 6th with Jay and Marco 7th. The final race saw the Kyle/Robert combination winning from Albrecht/Warwick and Tony / Dylan. Mark and Colin had their best finish of the regatta in 4th. The race also only saw 6 finishers with the Funkes having to go in for a new spinnaker halyard and Hans and Alan having left for home after race 6. Overall the regatta was a big success. Thank you to the Edwards and Lenz families for helping with the arrangements. Thank you also to VCA for hosting the event. It was a bit disappointing to only have 8 boats on the water when the nationals in 2007 boasted a record of 17 entries. Perhaps the dates should be revised for the following season.
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