In a steady breeze, Race Officer Gordon Mucklow sent us on one of the longer courses, beginning with a beat to B, off Silvers. Athene, recently afloat, joined us but was not prompt at the start. She had trouble with rigging.
Catriona rudely squeezed out Teal at the pin end of the line and got away well. Most of the fleet stuck to the Shandon shore so as to avoid the worst of the flood tide. Thalia went out early, which seemed wrong, but she was close behind Catriona at the windward mark. Next a spinnaker leg to F, off Shandon Church. Good air from behind brought Thalia up to the leader. A late running Piper complicated the rounding of the leeward mark. Thalia ended up taking penalty turns. Wind had now begun to diminish and become fluky. The remainder of the fleet took some time to reach F.
The next leg, a beat to Clynder. In the middle of the loch there was a suggestion of breeze but adverse tide. On the Clynder shore, even less pressure but out of the tide. Pipers prospered in the middle, Garelochs did not.
No boat reached the finishing line before the time limit. A Broadley finish with results taken as the order at C, the last mark to be rounded.
1 Catriona, 2 Thalia, 3 Thia, 4 Ceres, 5 Teal, 6 Athene.
President: