Far better conditions met the Optimist sailors in Dun Laoghaire yesterday with decent breeze and brighter weather than the dismal opening day. With forecast for Saturday not so great 3 races were the order of the day.

The SDC news was that Dylan McEvoy moved himself up from Regatta fleet to Junior fleet after day 1. Dylan felt he was up to the greater challenge on the outside course and while he had a baptism of fire, I gather he loved every minute of it. First off he broke his mast in his first race and after a trip back to dock and a quick replacement, he was kindly towed back to the race course by Richard Cullen from The Jelly Bean Factory. In the next race he got hit by the boom and turtled but recovered to complete the race. He finished the day off with a very respectable 67 out of 92 in his first outing in a fleet such as this.

Both Oscar Langan and Rory McEvoy have certainly seen a difference in the length and quality of racing in this their first major event. Both lads are enjoying the experience while Shane O’Brien suffered a couple of black flags in the last 2 races of the day. Put it down to experience.

As I write the Senior and Junior fleets have just launched after a 3 hour postponement due to high winds. Looks like Regatta fleet will be sitting out the afternoon on dry land. All SDC boats are on their way out with 17 knots of wind, gusting 23 knots and quite a big swell. Good luck to the guys. Again thanks to Aidan Tarbett Photography and The Jelly Bean Factory for shots of our Optimist competitors.

Down in Lough Ree Yacht Club, the IDRA14 also had their share of thrills and spills with 3 races completed. Some controversy also as Alan Henry fell foul of the race officials after winning race 2 of the day but was DSQ for not coming back through start line on one of the legs. I gather almost half the fleet was DSQ. With a discard now kicked in Alan Henry/Simon Revill are now joint second with Frank Hamilton (DMYC) behind SDC’s Alan Carr/Ian McCormack with last years National Champion Julie Ascoop (CYBC) in 4th with SDC’s JIm Lambkin/Wendy Rudd in 5th. Gordan Kelly/Mark Masterson in 10th and Charles Sargent/John Lynch in 14th complete the placing for the Sutton crews. As is usual the day was completed with a crews race and again Sutton boats were to the fore with Simon Revill taking first from Wendy Rudd in what was a very close race.

Again as I write, the fleet are about to launch in very tough conditions for what is the last scheduled race of the Championship with a couple of Sutton Dinghy Club crews in with a real chance of victory with one race to go.  

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