Topper open meeting at Island Barn Reservoir SC, Saturday 21st September
Published 21:28 on 22 Sep 2024
Two of our Junior Sailors (Arthur PJ and Henry Joseph) journeyed the 15 minutes to the other side of Hampton Court Bridge to join another 50+ young racers at the Topper Open Meeting at Island Barn Reservoir SC on Saturday 21st September 2024.
After negotiating the mechanical winch to pull the boats up to the reservoir edge we enjoyed spectacular views of Sandown Park race track, the Surrey hills and a large cumulo-nimbus system which loomed all morning, sapped all the wind but never quite delivered what it threatened to unload.
Racing in such a large fleet of boats presented a few challenges for the competitors and the race organisers alike. Who knew that all that practice on the Dodgems track at Hampton Court Funfair earlier in the summer would come in quite so handy as it did in the last minute before the race starts! Or that it would be a pretty good idea for the person on the race committee boat writing down the boats' finishing places to mark down very clearly which boats had been lapped!
Anyways, the morning racing degenerated into a typical Tammy drifter of a race and a game of avoiding the glassy mirror patches and sailing towards the wavy ripple patches - if you were able to stay awake at all...
Then fortunately, lunch intervened and the Island Barn galley crew served up magnificent dishes of cottage pie, veggie lasagne, garlic bread and salad.
And in the afternoon, the sun came out, the wind picked up and while the kids enjoyed 3 fine races in a building breeze, the parents put on their sunglasses, cracked open the cool beers and enjoyed what felt like the last day of summer!!!
A big thank you to all the volunteers at Island Barn for putting on such a successful event for so many visitors in what were very tricky sailing conditions.
Last updated 12:19 on 10 October 2024