Thorpe Bay Yacht Club

Tel: 01702 587 563

Dear Finn Sailor

The J.M.Finn & Co. Finn National Championships is fast approaching and takes place over the 4,5, & 6th of July at Thorpe Bay Yacht Club in Essex.

The club would like to extend a warm invitation to you to enter the event that has been generously sponsored by J.M.Finn & Co. stockbrokers. The entry fee includes a free BBQ on the Friday and the Finn Championship Dinner with live music on the Saturday night. Food will be available during the day and on Thursday evening and the club has a great veranda for supporters to watch the racing from. (Handily placed within a short stagger from the bar!)

The club is looking forward to hosting the Finns and has gone to great lengths, re-furbishing the changing rooms, smoothing the beach and laying astro-turf especially to make launching easy for us all!

North Sails and Yachts & Yachting have kindly donated trophies and prizes and our new class sponsor has also provided shirts for every entrant. There will also be trophies for top Junior and each Master’s category so whatever your age group there will be plenty to race for. The Olympic squad have promised to attend so don’t miss your chance to pit your wits against Britain’s finest Finn sailors.

Car Parking

TBYC has ample free car parking and boat storage facilities in the field to the east of the main dinghy park. On arrival you will be given a TBYC car sticker that must be displayed in you car in order to get free car parking.

Accommodation

TBYC is just a couple of miles along the seafront from Southend-On-Sea so has a good selection of hotels and B&B’s. We have listed details of a few local places that are a short distance from the clubhouse.

www.roslinhotel.com

www.beachesguesthouse.co.uk

www.premierinn.com – search for their Thorpe Bay Hotel

If camping facilities are required please contact us. Depending on numbers we can accommodate camping and camper vans at the clubhouse.

If you have any questions regarding the weekend please contact [email protected] or the Club Secretary Lorraine Stevens. The Club Secretary can be contacted between 10am and 2pm Tuesday to Friday.

Address

115 Thorpe Bay Gardens
Thorpe Bay
Essex
SS1 3NW
Tel: (01702) 587563

Email – [email protected]

Entries.

Notice of Race – Finn National Championship

Sailing Instructions – Finn National Championship

Entry Form – Finn National Championship

To avoid the late entry fee, get your entry form and payment in by June 23^rd to Allen Burrell.

We are really looking forward to welcoming as many Finns as possible to the event and can guarantee you great racing and a fun social time…make sure you don’t miss it!

Best wishes from the Thorpe Bay Finn fleet,

Allen, John, Sander, Mark, Keith & Laurence.

Race Report

Wetsuit Outlet Pico Series

Summer Races1&2

Once again, huge thanks to Peter Thompson for his sponsorship of yet another Pico Series. Peter’s enthusiasm for increasing Cadet and Family membership at TBYC and getting as many people as possible on the water, enjoying sailing, is legendary. The sight on the water at the start of the first race of the Summer Series proved excellent vindication of all his generosity and dedication to the club as 26 Picos and 49 Cadets and adult family members vied for the best position from which to attack the first beat.

The spirit of this series was evident from the crowd that gathered at the top of the slip for the pre-race briefing; experience ranging from National Champions and sailors with 20+ years of competitive sailing behind them (sailing with less experienced sailors to encourage and coach them), to complete novices to racing, some with only a couple of hours in a boat! Particular thanks to Chris Clarke (ex club Sailing Secretary), whom I caught walking through the dinghy park before racing, on his way home having decided not to sail that day. It took hardly any persuading on my part for him to drive home, get his sailing gear and offer to take one of our newest members, Jourdan Swindon, out on the water to coach him through his first experience of sailing at TBYC. The smile on Jourdan’s face at the end of each race was exactly what the club is surely all about and payment indeed for Chris’s generosity (particularly as he had to endure being lapped by Alex Farrall, who often sails with Chris as his crew on the RS200!!).

The first race got off to a clean start with some of the regular leaders finding the sheer numbers on the line a little difficult to cope with and by the first mark, several were still buried in the pack with a lot to do. Laura and Adele did magnificently in their first ever race and despite early setbacks and a couple of swims, persevered (in a tide that turned over an hour before high tide!) to sail unaided back to the slip between races with grins still in place and the desire to get back out and do it again! Well done girls, keep it up and with that attitude, you will soon be sailing up the fleet!

I was delighted that no-one was disqualified for missing the gate on the upwind leg, everyone having taken heed of my briefing where I mentioned the rule on several occasions (so a huge ‘sorry’ to Peter, my helm, who had to shout at me to remind me of my own briefing!). There was a treat in store for our valiant race officers as the final beat played out like an Americas Cup match-race, between Vicky and Tina Little and Thomas and Tracy Metcalf, with helms covering every tack and jostling for line-honours, which were eventually snatched by the Metcalf’s in a nail-biting finish.

The start of the second race was like watching an open meeting (less infringements and no-one OCS, or over the line, though). It was one of the best starts in a Pico Series (or club race) I have ever seen and even Wes, on the rescue boat, was impressed and he knows a thing or two about one-design starts, being a regular contender at Laser open meetings…

Anyway Peter found himself (and his apparently heavy crew) closing on the front-runners and at one point in second place, with the wind becoming more fickle, there were huge gains (and losses) to be made in a race where the tide played a significant role!

The amount of learning that goes on in these conditions is phenomenal and when surrounded by so many other identical boats, good decisions and bad, are shown up immediately as are techniques and concentration! A win for Alex Farrell and Max Duce was thoroughly deserved after they calmly survived a nervy 5 minutes at the windward mark with the rest of the fleet closing on them as they did pirouettes in their own vacuum! Having let us get within touching distance, they re-connected the di-lithium crystal and promptly disappeared over the horizon!

Thanks to Shaun Christian for lending us his family’s Pico. We had ‘bagged’ a club Pico, but when a new member arrived to sail, I knew they should take precedence, so without Shaun’s generosity and trust, we wouldn’t have got on the water. Remember folks…the Club Pico’s are designed for Sail Training and encouraging new members, (who may have ordered a boat, but not yet have it in the dinghy park). As such, please do get down early and ‘bagsy’ a club Pico if you want to use one, but remember that you may be asked to share it with a new member if deemed appropriate by one of the Cadet Team.

Finally, thanks to the Race Officers; Linda, Lisa, Debbie and Jane (and Bev, who had offered her services before the race). Without these volunteers none of us could race so if you are not involved in racing yourself and fancy helping out (it is a great way to watch the racing and learn about how racing actually works), let one of them know on a Thursday night and they will be happy to get you involved – it really isn’t rocket science!!

See you all at the top of the slip on Saturday…

Rupert Snow

Good luck to Chris Boshier in the Contender Europeans which start next week in Tuscany, you can follow his progress by clicking on the following link.

http://www.contender.it/euro2008/

14 Sandhoppers joined in with the Hobday Trophy race on Sunday, the weather was great including the force 6 which always makes for some interesting sailing, Sandstar took top spot in our group followed by Sandstorm and Satisfaction, the surprise of the day was watching Apollo limp slowly around the course with a hungover crew that appeared to be fishing using the barnacles on their keel as bait, this helped add to the banter on the balcony whilst celebrating the clubs 60th anniversary.

The Sandhoppers will make their way to Burnham this bank holiday Monday in preparation for the Nationals the following weekend.

Any last minute entries can download all the details on the link below

Download the NOR & Entry Form here

Due to the Air show exclusion zone we will have to swap the Shoreline Trophy with the Petal plate.

The programme alterations now read

Petal plate 25th May 14.30 start

Shoreline trophy 8^th June 15.00 start.

If you are visiting the TBYC website for details on the Laser Pico Nationals please click on the “Nationals” tab on the left had side of the screen for further details, including Sailing Instructions and Entry Forms. Also see the how you could win a new Pico.

What a great way to end a working day

Author: Paul Spratt

Dear Boys and girls of the fast cats section. Now I have your attention, I’m looking to Kick start the racing again at the club and would value your opinions. Please can I get all your email address so I can send out reminders and also find out if you are needing crew. We have a thriving club at TBYC , lets use it.

Any sailors, old or young who fancy a go on a high flying projectile. please get in touch for the ride of your life, Sorry Barry, we saw two Sandhoppers trying to replicate at Cat, not fast but very funny.

Open meetings for fast or slow cats are a great way of improving both racing and social skills, if anybody fancies going to a meeting, please let me know as we can help with de-rigging etc. and possible transport to the event. On the last Bank holiday this Month, there is the “Hurricane Nationals” at Stokes bay on the south coast and also a Cat open. Several boats from TBYC are planning to be there, the more the merrier with a great social atmosphere. See you soon. Email: [email protected]

Three boats from TBYC attended Raid de Carnac 2008, Ian and Simon Keam-George, who managed to break their mast on the way to the event but organise another just in time to start racing, finishing mid fleet just above David White & Jon Sweet, both teams on their new F18 Cats. David had a few of his own problems, one of which was just trying to get over the channel with out his passport. On Davids first race in the 125 strong F18 fleet, he managed to break his rudder stock which ended in a capsize in the middle of this lot, Sh**! and had to retire till the next day. Wayne and my self on the Hurricane 5.9sx had a great first day with a position of 16 out of a 41 boats, sailing in a F5 but that was the end of the wind. The following 3 days had dying or no wind, resulting in less races being run than usual. Our long distance race of 40 nm ended being timed out after 6.5 hours on the water and 100 yds from the finishing line, We could almost smell the beer! Carnac is set in the Gulf of Morbihan which is just in the bay of Biscay, Lovely place with sunny beaches etc. but! this was my first visit to Carnac YC and this event, the French club just couldn’t organise a pi??-up in a brewery. All this, makes you thankful to the hard work put into running TBYC and the sailing program. Our races! 99% are run on time! and all with members support. Well done! Cheers from your fast cat capt.