Results / Open Penarth YC - 15/07/2012

Turn left at the RS200 Fat Face Racing Circuit Event � Royal Torbay YC, 21/22 June 2003 The majority of the RS classes went to Torbay for their annual Fat Face Racing Circuit mega event with the RS200�s and RSK6�s at the Royal Torbay. For once Torbay was not at its best, providing false optimism and not delivering. Saturday was sunny and warm with a north east breeze building slowly all morning so crews sailed out to the start sitting out hard. Once the course was set this breeze slowly faded so racing took place in a patchy force 2-3with a fairly big sea, which proved hard work. Sunday saw the bay a flat calm and as competitors were wondering when the racing would be abandoned a northerly breeze filled in giving the Royal Torquay YC club race good spinnaker reaches. A course this time was quickly set and race 4 started in a force 2 only to switch off completely on the second run leaving the fleet to drift to the finish. With no sign of wind racing was abandoned, a decision the fleet was grateful for when the prize giving took place to a back drop of grey, heavy drizzle. Lee Sydenham and Anne Vaudrey were off to a flyer in race 1, winning by a big margin from David Giles/Fiona Clark and Steve Dunn/Laurie Dunn. Race 2 saw the real trend start for going left with Ralph Singleton/Ollie Singleton winning from Paul Dorer/Ian Robertson and Tom Hewitson/Jo Hewitson. Race 3 was very close with the leading three boats rounding the final windward mark covered by two boat lengths. Trudie Danbury/ Graham Ryder had been in the lead but the Dunns just led at the end of the final beat. A sharp luff saw Danbury doing a 720. The Dunns then won from Marshall King/Heather King with Danbury third. Consistency in a 41 boat fleet was everything and the Dunns were the only boat to have three top ten results to lead overnight. Race 4 was a real go left affair. James Stewart/Elaine Turner had won the fight on the left up the first beat to lead but suffered a little down the first run. David Giles, using all his Weir Wood light wind skills went hard left on the second beat, found the sort of shift/extra wind you can only dream about to take a good lead. The Dunn�s had also done well to the left to move into second. The wind now completely disappeared leaving the fleet drifting without kites to the finish. Giles won from the Dunn�s, Sydenham and King�s. With no more racing possible the Dunn�s won overall by a point with a very consistent display in difficult conditions with the best set of results by a mile. Giles and Sydenham in second and third have been well to the fore in 200 events all season. Behind these in fourth and fifth were probably the real performances of the event. The Irish brother and sister team of Marshall and Heather King produced the results they had threatened to do all year to claim fourth. Trudie �anyone seen Ugly� Danbury and Graham �Bert� Ryder produced a star weekend with four top ten finishes for a very popular fifth overall.