Results / Fat Face Racing Circuit Hayling Island - 20/04/2002

Fat Face Racing Circuit � RS700 - Hayling Island Sailing Club � 20/21 April 2002 One of the success stories of the year so far has been the meteoric rise of the RS700 fleet at Hayling Island. It was therefore of very little surprise that of the 31 boats at the Fat Face Circuit event, nearly half were from the home fleet. Debate had been rife on the e-mail about the HISC fleet and how they would fare against the rest of the 700 sailors. A main feature of the weekend was sun combined with light winds, providing pleasant, if somewhat testing, conditions. Saturdays racing was dominated by Ben Oakley with 1,1,2. Race 3 won by Nick Rizzi, but avoiding cricket scores was proving difficult. Other than Ben, only Tim Johnson (5,2,3), Neil Upton-Brown (6,3,2) and Pete Barton (4,9,5) kept their scores in single figures. There were also some notable absentees from the front of the fleet, namely Neil Robinson and Andy White, last year�s National Champion and runner up; they were obviously wishing that they could use their weight to better effect in the sloppy conditions. Optimism was high on the beach on Sunday as a nice breeze developed. However on the way out to the race course the wind softened, although the sailors could at least now fully extend on their wires upwind. In addition, a slight swell was running down the course which made downwind sailing interesting, with the apparent wind changing dramatically as the boats accelerated down what were quite small waves. Ben's mission was to defend his excellent first days results. This got off to a promising start when he posted a third, with Upton-Brown only a place in front and Johnson retiring to collect a new tiller extension. By race five, the wind had risen just enough to start favouring the bigger sailors and White set off into a huge lead which he extended by about half a leg by the end, proving that he still has what it takes to be at the top of this competitive fleet. Carl Vining scored his best run of the weekend with a second, and a fight emerged amongst the next 5 boats, with Paul Bayliss sneaking a few places literally on the line to win the battle for third. Having won the first race of the day, Bayliss claimed the last race as well, exorcising a few ghosts from a terrible Saturday, and depriving Johnson of the win he needed to take the meeting honours. Upton-Brown was third overall, the only sailor not to score a result out of the top ten, a real achievement in the conditions. So the meeting belonged to Ben Oakley, who with a combination of intelligent sailing, and excellent light wind boat speed was able to fly the flag for HISC. At the prize giving Ben thanked Race Officer Bev Moss for setting some good courses, and invited the fleet to come and experience the new clubhouse which opens in July, for some pre-nationals practice at Federation Week from 19th-23rd August.