D-One Open at Oxford Sailing Club
by Chris Sallis 1-2 April 2017
With a poor forecast and several regular D One sailors on ‘other duties’, a small fleet assembled at Oxford SC on the 1st and 2nd of April for the first event of the 2017 Travellers Trophy. Contrary to the forecast of light wind and rain the fleet headed out into a sunny force 3 on Saturday afternoon.
Race one got under way with Oxford local Terry Brookes nailing the first beat to round ahead of Paul Birbeck and Nick Crickmore. As these 3 took off downwind Chris Sallis gybe-set to hook up some good pressure on the left and pulled through to lead at the leeward buoy. Terry continued to chase but some loose covering saw Chris take the win.
Race two started in similar conditions with a tight first beat and downwind, this time Terry led at the bottom buoy followed by Nick and Chris. With the wind starting to swing left and right Chris found a passing lane on the upwind and managed to pull ahead into a comfortable lead with Terry taking second and Paul third.
Race three saw Terry going quickly on the first downwind and then extend his lead over Chris and Paul. So at the end of a great afternoons sailing Chris and Terry were separated by 1 point with Paul rounding out the top three.
Sunday started with a promising breeze but by the time the race got under way the conditions had got pretty funky with localised shifts and pressure all over the reservoir. Chris managed stand on from the start into a line of left hand pressure that he and Paul pulled away in. As the race progressed conditions got trickier and Paul who was having a great race got hung out to dry as the left-hand side glassed out and pressure came in from the right. This let Terry move through to 2nd but Chris had enough of a lead to get down to the finish and take the win.
With conditions not looking like improving the fleet had a quick on the water meeting and decided to head for the comfort of the club house. Everyone enjoyed a great event and had all benefited from some early season fleet racing. The Italian Nationals are being held at Santa Margherita Ligure near Portofino at the end of the month for those who fancy a weekend away and the next UK Travellers Trophy is at POSH on the 6th and 7th of May before the fleet heads for Lake Balaton in Hungary for the Gold Cup at the end of May.
Overall Results:
1st Chris Sallis
2nd Terry Brookes
3rd Paul Birbeck
4th Nick Crickmore
5th Gordon Davies