Donald McClaren sailing Sigmatic won the UK Sigma 33 British Championships on the home waters of the Northern Clyde at the weekend (June 21-23) with Dublin Bay's Tim Goodbody fourth overall in the 18–boat fleet at Helensburgh, Scotland.
Ten races were sailed according to the latest (and poorly presented) results on the Helensburgh Sailing Club website here
Three local Bangor boats, joined 15 others from all over the United Kingdom and Ireland for the Sigma 33 OOD Class Championships in Helensburgh, Scotland from 21-23 June. The boats and crews were treated to incredibly tight racing in the full range of Scottish summer weather; flat calms and scorching sun to driving rain and screaming winds! All spliced together with a warm and sociable welcome from Helensburgh Sailing Club and the Sigma fleet. The members of both former and latter enjoying much discussion of the new trial sails, with both results and conjecture indicating it's the crews not the sails that make the difference.
Despite the changeable weather, all ten races were completed and following the successes of the Royal Ulster/ Ballyholme fleet at the Irish Championships all three crews put in strong performances. Sula (D&E Taylor and crew), showed fantastic speed through out the event but suffered at the hands of some unfortunate start line incidents. Despite this they fought back to record multiple top 5 results and win the Silver fleet. Cariad (G Bell and crew), showed why they are never far off the pace at any event and at times were resurgent right at the front of the fleet fighting it out for line honours finishing a credible 7th overall. They were beaten only by local boats savvy to the complex tides of the race area, ten times Irish Champions White Mischief (T Goodbody and crew) from Dublin and newly crowned Irish Champions for 2013, Squawk (P&E Prentice and crew.) Squawk had a consistent regatta collecting multiple top 3 results, including two race wins. Leading by one point going into the last race fell at the final hurdle to finish 3rd Overall, drawn down the fleet by a single result in double figures.
The reigning Class Champion Sigmatic (D Mclaren and crew) won the event with as much flare and passion as they put into organising it. Whilst another boat local to Helensburgh, Close Encounters (G Whyte and crew) sailed a phenomenally consistent event to finish second just two point adrift.
1st Sigmatic (D McClaren and crew), 2nd Close Encounters (G Whyte and crew), 3rd Squawk (P Prentice and crew), 4th White Mischief (T Goodbody and crew), 5th Leaky Roof II (A Harper and crew). The class looks forward to joining South Caernarvonshire Yacht Club, Abersoch in June 2014 for the next class championship.
A fortnight ago, Dublin Bay's only entrant in the Royal Ulster YC hosted Irish Sigma 33 Championships in Bangor from 7th–9th June 2013 was past champion, Goodbody.
The White Mischief crew from the Royal Irish YC crew were fourth from a disappointing turnout of eight boats for the ten race series.
The Irish championships was won by Royal Ulster's Squawk sailed by Paul Prentice and followed by Elaine and David Taylor's Sula. Third was Signet of Kip (P Martin) from Strangford.
Full results here
