End of Season Youth & Junior Day at Ripon Sailing Club
by Lucy Priest 25 Oct 2022 12:13 UTC
15 October 2022
End of Season Youth & Junior Day at Ripon © Grace de Planta
Ripon Sailing Club celebrated the achievements of its Youth & Junior sailors at its annual Y&J Day on Saturday 15 October. The main focus of this event is always the racing for the Towers Cup, which is hotly contested by club members under 16 yrs old, with supported racing in the regatta fleet for the less experienced.
While normally everyone races on one course with coached support for the less experienced racers, this year the strong winds and unfavourable forecast led the race team to separate the fleets and initially hold the majority of the regatta fleet ashore.
It is becoming a tradition at this event for experienced adult members to provide mentoring to the youth sailors who provide the race, safety and coaching team to help develop skills, it is fantastic that so many of our youth sailors continue to give back to the club and volunteer to assist. The youth sailor race team of Coral Watt & Tom Bates in the race hut, with Frankie Jackson acting as safety lead on the water set a figure 8 course for the first race and even before the start it was obvious just how vicious some of the gusts were.
After a clean start many fell in at the windward mark which was receiving the full brunt of classic Ripon gusts which twist round the woods before hitting the lake. Some fast and furious downwind legs followed and the race was won by Ollie Lumb sailing the new Topper 6.4 rig, closely followed by George Spence who had opted to sail his Topper 4.2 rig due to the conditions and Ethan Wild in an ILCA4. Ellie Napier and Dan Marks who are both developing their racing skills found the conditions tough but completed several laps each before retiring.
Before the main fleet started their second race the regatta fleet launched using the club training fleet and got some heavy weather sailing practice in, doing relays out to one of the club marks from the jetties, with youth sailor Grace de Planta providing coaching support alongside several of the club's other instructors and coaches.
With a couple of changes of boat the main fleet started their second race on a triangle course. The wind didn't increase as quickly as forecast and sailors settled into the race, the two Fevas sailed by Grace Stockdale/Jamie Edmondson and Charlie Rowell/Toby Kidd enjoyed the spinnaker legs although they did a fair amount of swimming! Meanwhile Lumb, Spence & Wild whooped it up with some fast planing, closely followed by relative newcomer Hannah Marks (ILCA4) who learned to sail this summer. Whilst Marks struggled with the conditions and did a lot of capsizing, she gave fair warning that the game will be on next season once she has more race practice. Last on the water but certainly not last on handicap was Oscar Manning's Optimist showing that steady sailing usually pays off. Spence took the honours on handicap.
After a quick snack break, the regatta fleet got 2 short races in on a separate triangle course before lunch with the sailors quickly learning the importance of being on (or at least near) the line at the start and showing great reactions as the gusts continued to roll through.
After lunch the race team changed the course for the main fleet, opting to take them down through the narrows which provided great spectator viewing, particularly when one massive gust took all three front runners out in spectacular capsizes right in front of the clubhouse deck! Spence again won on handicap as the wind increased further and gusts started to top 30mph. Daniel Marks having sat out race 2 in the coach boat opted to get back onto the water and put into practice the hints and tips he'd received from the coach to stay with the fleet and finish both afternoon races.
The regatta fleet went out for a third race, but massive gusts saw the majority of the sailors heading promptly back to shore. However, Regatta fleet superstar Rowan Beardwell decided that she was up for joining the main fleet for their final race, which was held on a slightly shorter course but still sent the fleet into the narrows to get some longer reaching legs, Spence again won this race with Lumb and Wild in 2nd and 3rd.
With the wind still building and delivering icy blasts across the lake it was decided to scrap the traditional on the water games after the final race in favour of some club house games while the race team finalised prizes and 3 teams led by the youth sailors took on a spaghetti and marshmallow engineering challenge before the prize-giving.
In addition to the Towers Cup some of the club prizes were also awarded, including recognising some of the club pre-sailors (under 7s) who had participated in the Fleet trophy earlier in the year crewing in Mirrors. The Kickstarter series prizes for novice sailors were handed out, with Oscar Trenholme taking the overall prize. The Barbara Darling award was presented to Frankie Jackson. The Towers Cup and Topper fleet trophy were both won by George Spence. After the prize-giving over 60 people tucked into a massive pizza buffet feast served by Elaine and her galley team.
Youth & Junior sailing continues to go from strength to strength at Ripon SC and this is testament to the long term commitment the club has made to encouraging families to go sailing. 2022 has been another great year and 2023 is shaping up with more exciting plans and opportunities to further Y&J sailing at the club. Thanks to all the volunteers who made the day & all the Y&J activities throughout the year possible.