Stokes Bay saw a mix of old and new faces in the 27-strong RS700 fleet, and the first race saw last years circuit winner Andy White steam off the port end of the line into a lengthy lead, followed by Tim Dickinson, Paul Bayliss, Neil Robinson and Alex Koukourakis. White had such a substantial lead that the foursome missed seeing him finish, and started on a fourth lap letting David Cummings into second and Jon Heissig third. Race two and Robinson just lead around the first windward mark from Heissig, with Cummins close behind. The lead swapped around a few times between gusts, but Robinson was still having trouble learning the course, and let Heissig past on the final reach when he forgot where the finish line was. Nigel Walbank came in third and Pete Greenhalgh, having re-stepped his mast after an early introduction to the RS800 fleet in the first minutes of race one, was fourth. Several boats rounded the first mark pretty much together in the third race, and eventually Steve Butcher pulled through to a race win, followed by White, Robinson and Alex Southon. Overnight leader in his first 700 event was Greenhalgh, scoring a fourth and two redresses, nearly everyone else had at least one high score to count. Lighter and more stable winds produced even closer racing throughout the fleet on Sunday, and any mistakes lost a lot of places. Matt Humphreys, RS600 champion, sailing a new Harken logoed boat shook off some of his hangover with a spot-on start and led to the finish, with Dickinson, Robinson and Walbank snaking their way along the wind-lines behind. A large port-end bias to the line for race 5 went largely unnoticed by the fleet, but Cummins easily crossed the fleet and cruised off for victory, Heissig eventually getting ahead of White, Dickinson and Richard Smith. After some quick maths it was apparent that the last race would decide the event; Heissig was leading by two points from Robinson, in turn two points ahead of Cummins. After five different race winners, Robinson decided it was his turn. After a black flag disposed of Heissig, he flew off the start line and pulled away effortlessly to retain his title from Cummins and then White. Greenhalgh scored fourth overall, and another black flag victim Walbank held on to fifth. A good weekend of competitive racing was had by all helped by excellent race management from Stokes Bay and a mix of wind, tide (and a bit of sun).