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Flipside and I are hoping to be there but Anne's otherwise committed.  Anyone (max 9 stone-ish) fancy a sail with me, making allowances for the fact that this will be my first time out this season?  Post here or email to anne@annemurch.co.uk.  Thanks ...

Mike D
N3496

The Thames Area series gets under way with the traditional season opener at Ranelagh on Sunday 21st January.  Start time for the one long race is 14.30 - if the wind's light, bring an anchor and sleeping bags!

Mike D
N3496

Here's notice of the last Thames Area Meeting of the season at Twickenham on 15th October.  I'm assuming it'll be the usual 11am start with three races.  Twickenham SC is a very friendly club and they do great lunches with enormous puddings.  It's a good wide open reach of the river above Richmond and should provide us with some excellent sailing.

The Thames Area series still has things to be decided.  Graham and Zoe have already racked up enough firsts to win but second can go to any one of  Fran/Sophie, David W/Adele or Mike D/Anne.

Do come and support the meeting and enjoy the day on the river.

Mike D
N3496

It's the penultimate event of this year's Thames Area series - Sunday at Henley can only mean exquisite river sailing, a super friendly club, cakes rating 10 on the Zoe scale and a lawn fit to eat them on.  I'm imagining it'll be the usual 3 races, 11am start and John Meds claims to be a fully paid up member so pester him if you need instructions or more info.

Hope to see lots of you there (especially 'local' boats from Ranelagh, Twickenham, Desborough and Burghfield).

Mike D
N3496

Could someone who was there summarise the main decisions:  What was decided on the National status and rule re-write issue?  Did the sail change measurement proposal go through?  Thanks ...

Mike D
N3496

First day's results now posted at:  
http://www.salcombeyc.org.uk/content/racing-results/^regatta^National_Twelve_Regatta_2006/
15 entries (not bad).  Meds and Katy won from John Thornton and Nicole Mayhew.  Based on the weather we've been having today, I imagine it was quite breezy.  Wish we were there ...

Mike D
N3496

Just to remind you all that the Thames Area coaching day will take place at Desborough SC on the Thames near Shepperton this Saturday.  Start time - arrive 10am for 11am.  Leading the coaching will be Graham Camm, national champion, so you can't get any better than that.  And there'll be a chance to try out a double-bottomed boat.

If you're interested and haven't already indicated you're coming, post here or email anne@annemurch.co.uk, or phone 020 8783 9243.

Mike D
N3496

Just to say a big thank you to Paul Turner and the whole Trent Valley team for a great weekend.  Those of you not there missed a terrific first Gill river meeting.  Now if only we could all the tell the difference between port and starboard when it comes to going round marks ...

Mike D
N3496

Unfortunately, Anne and I won't now be able to go to Salcombe week. We have a nice two bedroom (sleeps 4) apartment close to the centre of town booked through Coast & Country Cottages.  I'll be cancelling in the next few days.  If anyone wants it, let me know so that we can coordinate cancelling and rebooking - email anne@annemurch.co.uk if you're interested.

Mike D
N3496

The Thames Area Series is about to reach its denouement and to guide your weekend planning, remember it's Henley on Sunday 18th and Twickenham on Sunday 25th September.  Both can offer, if the conditions are right, big waves, knee-trembling beats, exhilarating spray-in-your-eyes reaches, scary nose-diving runs and lots of helpers to launch you through the surf!  Or sometimes we have known them more gentle with nice teas.  Come and see which the weather gods serve up and support these two long-established and very friendly meetings.  Go on, put them in your diary now!

Mike D
N3496

We're currently requiring masts to be a minimum of 5.5kg.  As far as I can ascertain, that weight was chosen at some point simply to reflect the weight of Superspar carbon masts then on the market.

My Chipstow carbon mast came out at 1 kg lower.  I didn't specify a low weight - I just asked for a normal version of their standard carbon mast and that's what I got. As a consequence, I have a strip of lead fed in to each of the spreaders and a large lump wrapped round the mast above the goose neck.  

My mast appears to be perfectly robust enough - and other Chipstow masts, which also carry lead, seem to have been equally reliable.

I don't think it makes any sense for us as a development class to restrict the mast weight in this way.  For boats  that are on the borderline of 78kg, having a lighter mast is another way to get the boat down to weight.  From a PR perspective, wrapping lead around the mast says some odd things about the class.  

So, this is not an argument for reducing the all-up boat weight - we can have that elsewhere - but a plea for our mast weight to reflect what is now normal.

I plan to ask the technical committee to have another look at this but would be interested in others' views first - in case I have missed something critical which would justify retaining the 5.5kg min weight.

Mike D
N3496

As a non-Burton Week participant, just thought I'd say how much I'm looking forward to going back to Salcombe next week (after 15 years) and trying to remember the way round.  Looks like the weather is going to be good, at least for the first half of the week.  How many 12s can we expect?

Mike D
N3496

Annie, Flipside and I are planning to be there.  Anyone know the start time for Saturday's first race?

Mike D
N3496

Just reading in my just-out Ratchet (well done as always, Mike) about next year's 70th anniversary plans and especially the Anniversary Regatta at Pitsford event at Spring Bank Holiday.  It sounds great and of course we'd want to be there.  I just wondered where that will leave one of the most important annual meetings in our calendar - the Royal Harwich meeting?  I recognise in an already crowded programme that finding a three-day weekend that doesn't clash with an established meeting will be very tricky, and it's really important to be celebrating an important anniversary properly.  However, I also wouldn't want to see us losing RHYC as a meeting if we don't show up one year.  I assume all this has been thought through ...?

Mike D
N3496

One or two people today at Spinnaker had heard that the Pevensey meeting in July may be switched to Littlehampton.  Is this confirmed?

Mike D
N3496