Generous handicap helps Frequent Flyer sail to victory in Flying Fifteens division

Flying Fifteen skipper Wayne North realized he had been given a very generous handicap for his harbour course event last Saturday, which was sailed in a brisk easterly blowing at a steady 20 knots.

He had a four-minute start on Aileen Lucas in Crazy and a nine-minute start on Simon Lucas in FForever Young.

North stormed away, showing good speed as Crazy and FForever Young gave chase and valiantly tried to bridge the gap.

They began chopping down North's big lead, with FForever Young catching up to Crazy, which was sailing well in windy conditions.

Frequent Flyer kept ahead with its substantial lead, and although the chasers had knocked off several minutes each, it was to no avail as North sailed on to his second big win.

Crazy had done well to take second spot ahead of a fast-finishing FForever Young, which was third and fastest.

Division two also sailed in a handicap start, and Stephen Brown in Mary Maitland and Bob Giles in Footloose started on the same drop — and what an interesting beginning that was, with Brown winning it narrowly.

Stephen Lee in Flasheart began four minutes later, and the chase was on.

Brown was the early leader and doing well under spinnaker, and Giles wasn’t far off the pace.

Just as Flasheart began making inroads on the leaders, it suffered spinnaker halyard problems which caused loss of time, and the other two slipped away.

Brown proved a little too good for Giles and went on to win by more than a minute.

Giles was happy with sec-ond place. Flasheart recovered and went on to finish in third place.

Geoff Oliver in Excitable was given a two-minute start in division one over Murray Deere’s Wild One, and it proved not to be enough as the larger Wild One quickly overhauled the smaller boat.

Both yachts showed great speed under spinnaker but Wild One, with its huge sails, surged well ahead and stayed there for the duration, going on to an easy win and recording fastest time in a mighty effort.

Deere was pleased to actually be on the water in competition, as was Oliver, and both look forward to their next meeting.