Wow! How a week can change things! Last week it was the third month of rain cold and wind, and suddenly Weston Open Meeting turned into a sunny sea breezy event that lifted the heart as early as it lifted the boats.
For me it was a positive event but I had mixed feelings after saturdays racing, I hit the bricks pretty hard while leading the first race saturday and had to retire with a damaged foil. That was stupid of me. Next race I was leading and speared a fish which had to be pulled off by hand. That was stupid of the fish.
Still I was going fast I suppose. Both Jason Belben and Mike Lennon were sailing well.
I owe my sunday to Peter Barton who had a spare wand, I must have broken my wand holder as I went over the front in Saturdays first race. I won the first race comfortably on Sunday and then did we have fun in the second! Ricky Tagg did all hard work to get to the front but on the run there were signs of a sea breeze and I hit the deep water hard. Ricky, Mike Lennon and I somehow got to the first mark together and we reached down the run, and then procession like, we then reached back up the beat, Mike nipping inside me when I couldn't gybe at the spacer mark due to traffic, and won the race. The final race was a flicky "careful you don't capsize to windward/is the sea breeze here to stay or not type race". There were certainly quite a lot of holes and Jason and I duked it out quite a long way in front of everyone else. I led initially, Jason came back at me but then I crossed him back. It went on this way for a very long time and was good fun and hard work but I just got a gust to whip me round the windward mark while Jason struggled to foil after a tack. In the end it was a big gap that didn't tell of the closeness of the race.
Sorry to miss the prize giving, I was running late for another meeting about cars! In my experience the event was not dissimilar to how I remember Campioni can be. It was great training for the big one.
Great to see everyone
Si
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