Tranquil Tuesday - Prosecco conditions

9th May - Second evening of DBSC racing in the harbour.
A fine turnout of 15 Lasers, many of whom had recently completed a weekend training session, put on a scintillating display of close racing in a 6-8 knot breeze from 110 degrees. Darach Dineen and Damien Maloney finished 1st and 2nd in both races while 3rd was taken by John Marmelstein and Conor O'Leary respectively. "Places on the podium are hard - damn hard - to come by these days," muttered an anonymous source.

Elsewhere, Des Fortune pulled off a third successive victory in the Finn while the second race was snapped up by debutant Dara McDonagh's RS400 -despite attempting to miss the last lap! Looks like a fast boat..... Des leads the series, as Richard Tate and Tom Murphy did their stint with the amazing RC team on Firebird.

In the IDRA14's - another fleet with a healthy turnout - Dunmoanin (Frank Hamilton) and Slipstream (JulieAscoop) scooped the race wins. In the Fireballs Clandog Millionaire (Clancy Brothers) claimed a double bullet again - DBSC results here

Fortune Doubles up on Opening Night

DBSC dinghy racing finally got going this Tuesday after last week's blowout. It has to be said the harbour looked pretty busy with a very decent turnout of boats arriving to compete for the inaugural conferring of bragging rights. Dispensing with the unremarkable wind conditions (it was a bronchial 4 or 5 knots from the NE or whatever), there was some darn good racing to be had during the two races provided by a very slick race management team. Apart from some delicate bumps and muttering on the start line, silence ruled from start to finish as concentration and cunning stealth became the premium assets of those vying for victory.

Des "Ben" Fortune in his Finn secured two back to back wins in the PY fleet while the results show a similar feat by Damian Slingsby-Maloney in the Laser and yet again a double bullet by the Clancy Brothers in the Fireball fleet. Only the IDRA14 fleet could not agree who would win both races and therefore had to procure two different winners. Full Results here.

So, it was a calm and somewhat blissful summer evening, a joy to behold for the thronged spectators on the East Pier. The only disappointment for the baying crowds was Conor O'Leary abject failure to capsize - not even once! Perhaps they would have had more to cheer had they amassed in the RStGYC to witness Conor's namesake, "Young Man" O'Leary receive his incoming Captain's hat of office from outgoing Laser Tsar Craigovich. Captain Ross has organised training for Lasers on Friday evenings and Sunday mornings for the month of May, a great initiative to build both the numbers and skill levels of the fleet.

Finally, Troy McNamara presented an excellent talk in the George entitled "Be Your Own Sail Coach," with some particularly good tips on how to use your grey matter to climb up the leader board. On the water training sessions are available for single handers and double handers. Highly recommended that you sign up for some coaching, it's not expensive and it will do you a world of good. Click here or here if you are interested or would like a copy of Troy's slides. It all makes perfect sense, nothing to lose and everything to gain!