Last sailing races before Games

This is the sailing report from last night’s race:

Brinton 4

The 4th race of the Brinton series was held on Thursday evening in blustery and wavy South-Westerly conditions on a course between a mark near the Spanish pier (off the runway) and a mark inside the harbour near the Southern entrance. There was a good turn out with 9 boats participating which was especially pleasing considering that two of the more regular sailors were away on holiday and could not participate, hence justifying the sailing committee’s decision to hold some Kings Cup races on Thursday evenings for the first time.

Although this was the 4th (and theoretical last) race of the series, the Series would not be decided as a result of the previous weeks race – Brinton 3 – being cancelled. This race will now be sailed for in mid-September.

At the start it was probably Louis Triay Snr in Viking and Micko Capurro in Andromeda who got the best starts but as the boats tacked off towards the entrance to the harbour, it was soon clear that Hamish Risso in Fencer and Charlie Lavarello in Flash, had taken up the lead and created a pretty comfortable buffer between them and the following boats.

Although Hamish had a decent lead on his way into the harbour, Charlie Lavarello upped his game and with a set of perfectly timed tacks soon not only put pressure on Hamish’s lead but actually managed to pass him and reach the first mark at the head of the fleet.

In the downwind run that followed Hamish managed to remove the three boat length advantage that Charlie Lavarello had over him thanks to some good work by Paul Borda on the spinnaker, and draw level and then pull away from his rival to reach the second mark with a five boat length advantage.

On the following leg Hamish managed to extend his lead over Charlie in the wavy seas off the North Mole only to see that lead diminish as Charlie proved to once again be the faster sailor in the flatter seas inside the harbour.

At the same time Monty Spindler in Temptress managed to pull himself ahead of the chasing fleet to start putting pressure on Charlie Lavarello and the two of them continued their tense battle all the way to the finish.

As the boats entered the harbour for the final time, the whole fleet bunched up but Hamish was able to hold off his rivals for his second win of both the series and the season. Behind him Charlie Lavarello managed to come in second just a boat length ahead of the resurgent Alex Dobbs who managed to replicate his heroics from the previous race, and match his best ever finish in third place with Monty Spindler (who had been covered by Charlie Lavarello in the final stages) having to settle for fourth.

Brinton 4 Results

Hamish Risso in Fencer (Crew Paul Borda and Miro Kunis)
Charlie Lavarello in Nemesis (Crew John Armstrong and Edgar Lavarello)
Alex Dobbs in Zeus (Crew Alaine Navarro)

The results mean that Charlie Stagnetto, Charlie Lavarello and Hamish Risso are all bunched up at the top of the Kings Cup leader board with only a couple of points separating the 3 and Monty Spindler a few points behind them.

In the Brinton series, Hamish (7 points) and Charlie Lavarello (8 points) will go into the final race as favourites for the series although Alex Dobbs and Monty Spindler can also win the series if they get a favourable set of results in that final series race.

Victory Sailing now takes a break of several weeks due to the Island Games commitments and will return on the 20th July with the LW Triay Trophy Qualifiers.