The 2016 Royal Ocean Racing Club's De Guingand Bowl Race was held in the Solent and South Coast of England in highly changeable conditions. During the course of the race the wind direction swung to every point on the compass and the wind strength varied from zephyrs to 16 knots. Keeping your head out of the boat for the changes and pre-empting and correctly adapting to them was the key to success. RORC racing manager, Nick Elliott, chose a longer course of 123 nautical miles for the faster yachts and a shorter course of 105 nautical miles for the smaller and slower boats, with the overall result being decided on average speed.
Christoph Avenarius & Gorm Gondesen's German Ker 46, Shakti had a fantastic race, taking Line Honours, Class IRC Zero and the overall win for the best corrected time under IRC for the fleet. It is a great start to the season for Shakti. The key regatta for the German team is the RORC IRC National Championship in late June, where Shakti will be competing with about a dozen Fast 40+. Second overall and winner of IRC Three was Arnaud Delamare & Eric Mordret's JPK 10.80 Dream Pearls. Hugo Tardivel's A31 Columbus Circle was third overall and first in IRC 4. However the results in IRC 4 are subject to a pending protest.
In IRC 1, Nick Jones' British First 44.7 Lisa was the winner. Michel Peretie's French prototype Stamina was second with Seb & Michael Blair's King 40 Cobra third. Nick Jones' First 44.7, Lisa leads the class for the season and is second overall for the Season's Points Championship.
"It was an extremely tiring race, a great win and we had a bit of everything." commented Nick. "We did get becalmed a couple of times between The Solent and Owers Buoy, which was frustrating and there were lots of apparent losses and gains during the race; we all had our moments. The big race for Lisa this season is the Round Ireland and although Lisa's co-skipper, RORC Commodore, Michael Boyd was sailing his new boat for this race, we did have six of the crew on board and it was good to jell together. Lisa is a production boat and cannot point anywhere near as high as the race boats but you can manage that. For example in this race, we could see on the AIS that there were boats stuck with no wind under The Needles, so we put in a half mile tack offshore as we passed St.Catherine's Point, so that we could lay past The Needles. We would have been history if we had got stuck there and by having a better angle, we could also foot-off. Lisa is a heavy boat and in light airs, upwind, we tend to sail five to ten degrees off the wind to keep her going."
In IRC 2, Roderick Stuart & Bill Ram's Corby 37, Aurora was the winner. RORC Admiral, Andrew McIrvine racing First 40, La Réponse was second with the Army Sailing Association's J/111, British Soldier in third. Whilst in IRC 3, Arnaud Delamare & Eric Mordret's class win, racing JPK 10.80 Dream Pearls, was enough to put the French team into the class lead for the season. Thomas Kneen's JPK 10.80 Sunrise was second in IRC 3 for the race and James Chalmers' Weymouth team racing J/35 Bengal Tiger was third.
In IRC 4, RORC committee member, Stuart Greenfield racing Silver Shamrock was second to Hugo Tardivel's A31, Columbus Circle, with Noel Racine's JPK 10.10, Foggy Dew third. Robert Nelson's J/105, Bigfoot was fourth in IRC 4, which was enough to put the Two-handed team in first place overall for the RORC Season's Points Championship.
Stuart Greenfield found Silver Shamrock by chance on a trip to Falmouth Cornwall last year and bought the half tonner on the spot. "Silver Shamrock was built for Harold Cudmore by Killian Bushe in Cork and won the 1976 Half Ton Cup. Harold painted her in the colours of his credit card because that's how he paid the builder. After winning the cup the boat disappeared and I found her by luck in Falmouth and sailed her back to Cowes on my own. Silver Shamrock has been refitted and converted to asymmetric sails. My big race of the season is the SORC Round the Rock race this summer, a single handed race to the Fastnet Rock, so over the winter I refitted her to Category 2 standard and took eight coats of anti-fouling off her hull amongst other things."
It was a fantastic feeling to do so well in the De Guingand Bowl Race, when we were becalmed on the first night and the fleet just left us, we never gave up and just kept the boat moving. After coming around the Nab Tower, we must have put in 25 tacks to keep the boat moving. We stayed up all night and managed to get a zephyr and sailed the boat right in under Culver Down, which kept us going. As dawn was breaking, we went right in at St. Catherine's Point to take advantage of the tide, as it turned. We also got into good pressure and according to the tracker we went from a poor ranking position to second in class in those last few hours - never give up."
The Royal Ocean Club's Season's Points Championship continues on Saturday 28th May, over the May Bank Holiday with the Myth of Malham Race. The 256 nautical mile Cowes - Round Eddystone - Cowes course is weighted 1.2 for the championship and a highly competitive fleet is expected to be racing.
