The sun shone, and the Mirror reflections were evident on the water, for the first of the 2013 Southern Travellers at Poole. Six races over two days were held in a variety of conditions and tested the tactical acumen gained during the winter squads with significant wind shifts - demonstrating the benefits of getting in the groove with the shifts.
This weekend it's the second Neilpryde Nationwide Event which will be at Looe SC. For the discounted enter please enter on line via SailRacer before 9pm Wednesday. http://www.sailracer.org/events/event-v2.asp?eventid=171396 . The Notice Of Race is published. Look forward to seeing you at the weekend.
At last, Mirror sailors might have said, we have a day of sunshine and a pleasant wind for racing. Hollingworth Lake welcomed 9 visitors to the Open Meeting on Saturday, 20th April. The event was dominated by 3 boats from Beaver SC, with Emma Grayson and Ben Settle taking the win, with a particularly clear margin in the third race.
Lough Derg YC have given us an update on the overall program for the event which replaces some of the provisonal information we had on this website's event page. Also note that there is a currently a problem with the Mirror Worlds 2013 website domain name "www.mirrorworlds2013.com" which is getting incorrectly re-directed. Lough Derg are investigating.
On the 13th April the mirrors gathered at Otley Sailing Club for the second of the Mirror Northern Travellers. The wind was light in the morning for the first race and consequently very shifty. Throughout the day we were met with some very large gusts that came through every now and again, sometimes coming in at different angles.
The line was short for the first race and with the wind not being very prominent it was hard to tell which direction it was coming. Luckily those who started at the port end managed to tack off getting ahead of the rest of the fleet already-Emma and Ben, and Emma and Faye got lucky here. The beat was very shifty and it soon became apparent that having knowledge of the lake paid off massively as Emma and Faye reached the windward mark first leaving the rest of the fleet behind. As the wind speed was fluctuating all day, it became clear that you had to be in the right place at the right time and as a result, Emma and Ben managed to get ahead, then followed by Chloe and Izzy, and right behind them were Emma and Faye, fighting it out. The first race was won by Emma and Ben followed by Chloe, then Emma.
After the first race we went in for a lovely lunch provided by the galley, in preparation for two back to back races in the afternoon. In the second race the gusts really started to pick up and the shifts made the race very close to start with, Emma and Ben were out in the lead closely followed by Reg and George until, after a spontaneous gust, they capsized! Nevertheless the recovery was outstanding and they managed to maintain their second for the next leg however they had no bailer and half a sponge so Reg had to remove a boot and use that! Great idea...until George dropped it in the water and they had to go back for it. As a result they dropped back a few places but and absolutely brilliant comeback! The race finished with Emma and Ben winning that race-and the competition, and Emma and Faye came second-however the fun didn’t stop there!
In the final race the wind remained the same conditions as before however the start was much fairer and depended on who got the best position on the line. It was much closer this race as the majority of the fleet was near the front, this time with no one sailing miles ahead, and positions switched and changed all the time. This race saw no capsizes therefore it was all very fair and competitive. Chloe and Izzy won this race-well deserved, followed by Reg and George and then Emma and Ben.
It was a wonderful day with lots of fun-filled racing as usual and I hope to see everyone and more at Hollingworth and all the other travellers this year.
Report by Emma Grayson
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