Blink and before you know it the Thursday evening series is over. Yes it was the final night and if you hadn’t realised the weather gave a clear reminder, really overcast skies making for a gloomy evening on the water. So much so, it seemed almost dark when we launched at 18.30!
Thankfully the forecasted thundery showers never happened and it had kept almost dry at Gorleston. Nine boats launched onto a very flat North Sea, the wind a F2-3 from the NW making for a pleasant sail. With HW at 21.00 the tide was still flooding making for a long beat.
The club boats were in demand again with four of the five in use, with just the second Laser not being used.
Phil, back in his favoured and trusted Contender had a very good first beat, picking his line to the windward mark to perfection whilst several others headed too far inshore hoping to evade the tide and ending up reaching to the mark. After the first lap Phil had a good lead on the fleet which was fairly close together.
On the second lap, Team Ed, sailing the club 400, Richard (Solution) and Dave (Laser) closed the gap on Phil, helped by opting for the pin end of the gate rather than the committee boat which was down tide.
On the final lap Phil managed to hook the windward mark with his rudder. This not only allowed the rest to catch up but also helped them to see where the windward mark was as the light at this point was getting poor and spotting the marks getting quite difficult!
On corrected time Harry, swapping his Topper for a club Laser Radial emerged as winner of the final race of the season, with Dave second and Richard third.
Observations of the night :-
- Solutions can be hard to tack, just ask Chris
- Hitting a mark isn’t good, but hooking one with your rudder is really bad, just ask Phil
- If your kicker is going to break during a race, its best if it does as you cross the finishing line, just ask Harry. (although he did a very seamanlike repair on it in order to get back ashore unassisted!)
Big thanks go to Julia and Jamie for offering to do OOD duty. As it turned out it was probably the busiest night of the year for the race team so considering it was their first time they did a splendid job.
Once ashore the boats were packed away quicker than usual as the promise of a Pizza feast beckoned! A few weeks ago discussions were going on as to what to do on the final night of the Thursday evening series and the ‘Pizza on the Prom’ was the clear winner.
Thankfully is was still warm enough to sit outside with just shorts and tee shirts so tables and pizza area were set up on the Prom.
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The pizza team of Keith, Ed and Dave set up Pizza HQ comprising of two pizza ovens and the pizza preparation area. Keith had been busy during the day creating some super pizza toppings and with Keith and Ed making dough balls, pizzas were soon being cooked in the ovens. The team could teach Domino’s a few lessons with Pizzas being produced every couple of minutes, with close on twenty being cooked during the evening. Keith’s Goat cheese and caramelised onion pizza proved extremely popular while his Nutella and banana was clear winner in the sweet pizza category.
The evening proved to be extremely popular with much talk that we ought to do it again. It’s fair to say nobody left hungry. Big thanks must go to Keith and his able assistants for a great evening.
Whilst it was the final official Thursday evening sail several talked about continuing, much depends on the weather but watch out for news on the Thursday ‘Finale’.
Full results – http://www.gygsc.org.uk/Results/2022/2022Thursday.htm