Sunday 16th April
Report by Russ Chilcott, Photos Russ & Nigel Clarke
Results (no one is admitting to it!) > DF95 Open 2023 results

After a week of very windy weather, we arrived at Apex to almost a flat calm lake – typical! The OOD Richard Aucott set a triangle/sausage course with a leeward gate and windward finish line. Thankfully, the lightest of breeze picked up coming the south just enough to keep the fleet moving along.

There was a quick Skippers Briefing, as everyone was ready to go, we started things off a few minutes before 10am. 2 skippers were off at a time helping Richard as RO’s, leaving 9 to race.

Shaun Anderson from the Whitefriars club, local skipper Nigel Clarke and Bob Conner from the Woodspring club set the early pace in the very light conditions. They each won a race before we called an early coffee break in the hope the wind may increase.

After the break there was the occasional “puff” coming from pretty much any direction, which was great if you happen to be in the right place at the right time! I picked up a win together with John Woodman (Sedgemoor) but all the other races up to the lunch break were won by either Shaun, Nigel or Bob.

We returned after lunch to find the wind had increased in strength and swung more easterly, so the course was moved out to take advantage. Though it was now a little further away it was much better, and there were no deadly “Apex Holes” to avoid!

Shaun, Nigel and Bob continued to be the ones to beat often with John in close company. Occasionally myself, Alan Barnstable and/or Ed Plaster (all Sedgemoor) got into the auction but we were not quite consistent enough over all races. Alan though did finish in good form winning his last two races back-to-back.

By 3pm we had completed 16 races with all skippers having an equal number of turns as RO’s, so all agreed to call it a day.

Then came what turned out to be the really tricky bit – working out the results! In the Sedgemoor club we use a slightly different discard system from the MYA. This threw up an error at the time when inputting the scores into the laptop, and we gave out the wrong results – douch!

Soon after the meeting the error was spotted and the results corrected.
The clear winner was Shaun on 27 points, 2nd place had 3 skippers; Nigel, Bob and John all tied on 30pts. Nigel takes 2nd place just pipping Bob on countback, with John unlucky having to settle for 4th after earlier being told he had won it! I was best of the rest nicking 5th (36) spot ahead of Alan 6th (37). Other skippers are still new to DF95 racing or had to leave before the end so this is reflected in their results.

Despite the lack of wind at the beginning and a slight mess up with the results at the end it had been a good event.
The day ran very smoothly in good humour with a competitive spirit with no need for protests or any arguments.

A big thank you to Richard for giving up his Sunday to be the meeting OOD and doing such a great job.

Congratulations to the winner Shaun.

Shaun (right) receiving his winnings from OOD Richard