While the light winds were producing a high
scoring regatta at the Olympic Games in Qingdao, one had to reflect on the
contrast with the conditions at Skandia Cowes Week, where the breeze produced
plenty of material for this issue’s feature on coping with gear failure!
Somehow Cowes always seems to deliver at least a few days of big breeze, but it
usually has at least one light day as well. Although I love the excitement of
sailing when the wind is up, it has to be said that the best championships are
those that encompass a variety of conditions and test crews across the wind
range. In this respect Cowes delivered, although one could have done without
the amount of rain, which meant regular soakings afloat and ashore.
I enjoyed a real contrast of sailing during
the week. sailing on the J/92 ‘Neilson Redeye’ for a couple of days, with a big
crew, fun racing in the J-Sprit class, and courses that took us on a tour of
the western Solent. There was the extra challenge of a changing crew each day,
with most of us not having sailed together before. Despite the rain and odd
boat-handling mishap as positions on the boat were juggled, it was a lot of
fun!
Even the long days were to prove another
contrast, as I joined Chris Darling and Alastair Shaw on ‘Darling Associates’
in the 90-boat SB3 fleet, where we were back ashore by lunchtime most days.
Having won the Primo Cup earlier in the year, it was great to sail together
again, and even better that we also had Sian to make us up to a four-man
crew – a real advantage with the Solent to navigate as well as sailing the
boat. A long, close-tacking beat up the Gurnard shore on Thursday morning will
be one of the highlights of my
year. By then we were fourth overall, but had to suffer the pain of dropping to
seventh on the final day… it’s always a shame when that happens as it tends to
dampen what otherwise would be celebrated as a fantastic result.
How scary then must it be for those of our
Olympic sailors going into the meal race in a good position… with a counting
result that will be doubled, when the conditions are likely to be all over the
place, it will surely be a case of
a lot to lose for the leaders, and an exciting chance to snatch a
victory for those scraping into the top 10 with a lot of points to make up and
nothing to lose. I’m not sure who I’d rather be…
