A Truly Golden Experience
Ainslie / Simmer and Scott racing Etchells in the Solent.
One of the great things about sailing is the old adage that you get to play on the same course as Tiger Woods. It’s an idea which most of us are aware of, the dream of getting on the course with the best. But unlike golf, in sailing it it really is true, as the Solent Etchells fleet will find out on June 23rd and 24th when one of the greatest collections of gold medals and Americas cup wins in history will settle themselves in an Etchells and do battle with the weekend warriors for the Royal Yacht Squadron's Sir Kenneth Preston trophy.
Among the fleet there have been a fair few boats called The Trio based on the fact that it was traditionally a three-man boat (now sailed by a lot of smaller crews 4-up) but it is hard to imagine a more successful trio than Ben Ainslie, Giles Scott and Grant Simmer who will make up this trio. Between them they have five Olympic Gold medals, one Silver, five Americas cup wins as either sailor or design coordinator and an astonishing eight Finn World Championships
The Trio will line up in perhaps the Solent’s most competitive one-design class, although it should be noted that Ainslie and Simmer have both finished on the podium at previous Etchells world Championships so it's not exactly all new to them.
For details on how to join the fleet or for charter options for Sir Kenneth Preston Trophy contact David Franks davidfranks80@gmail.com +44 7768 063868
British Etchells National Championship 2018
Any time a boat gets to discard a second place in its winning scoreline, it suggests a walkover, but in the case of the 2018 British Etchells National Championship Lawrie Smith and his crew of Richard Parslow / Will Heritage and Gonçalo Ribeiro only took the championship on the last beat of the last race. In that race they had moved from well back in the fleet to eventual first place, snatching the title from Andy Beadsworth (Marco Pocci / Ben Cornish (sailing under the HKG sail number of Marco)) who for most of the last race had the destiny of the title in his own hands.
These two were head and shoulders above the rest of the 19 boat fleet, Smith finishing with six points, Beadsworth with eight while Peter Rogers / Neil Jaffa Harrison and Ben Cooper finished an extremely creditable third overall but with a rather distant 20 points in total.
Race one was sailed in a very light north westerly breeze with a strong cross tide from the east and the race was won by Tom Abrey/ Bruno van Dyck and Matt Reid. Unusually for the team on Jolly Roger however, this was the only time they saw the front all week and their regatta was challenging from the next race with an OCS leading them scoring a DFL in 19th.
Smith took second, Peter Rogers 3rd and defending National champion David Franks a solid 4th to kick off the defence of his British Championship title.