22/09/2019
Ouse Amateur open meeting Ouse Amateur Sailing Club

Report by Veronica Falat

The open meeting at Ouse Amateur S.C. on Sunday 22^nd September was the second Streaker event of the weekend, coming a day after the Haversham open. Veronica Falat and Mark Langston sailed in both and joined 4 local sailors at OASC for 3 races in a SE breeze that gave good windward and down-wind legs on the rather narrow and straight racing area at Saddlebow, just south of Kings Lynn. Considering the modest number of boats taking part, this was surprisingly competitive and action-packed!

It started gently enough. Ian Bradley led the first race from the start. Veronica, Mark and Simon Turner gave chase but, after the first beat, Ian was not closely challenged. Veronica followed him round the course while Mark held off Simon’s challenge and, further back, Hashim Tyabji finished well clear of Mike Pembery.

After lunch the other two races were held back-to-back. Again, Ian was soon in the lead but Veronica managed to keep close and race 2 developed into a tacking battle on each upwind leg. However, although they were so close, Veronica never managed to get past and, in the end, Ian was 1^st and so was already the overall winner of the meeting. Meanwhile Mark and Simon were fighting it out for 3^rd place and Hashim and Mike were doing the same for 5^th.

Race 3 was even more competitive. Mark was now going really well and determined to show off his river-racing skills. He led for much of the first lap but it was incredibly tight as the 4 leading boats tacked every few seconds up the beats, ran side-by-side on the down-wind legs and reached the marks overlapped. On the 2^nd lap, having spent all day trying to overtake Ian, Veronica at last got to a windward mark first with the others right behind her. However, then disaster struck as she didn’t bear away straight on to the run as expected by Ian and there was a crash resulting in damage to Ian’s bow. They both retired and Simon took the race win, just ahead of Mark.

Fortunately everyone was cheerful by the time they got ashore and able to discuss what happened. Ian was the deserved winner of the open meeting trophy and, as this was the final event in the East Anglian series, the overall results were quickly calculated and Veronica was presented with the East Anglian trophy for another year; she had come 1^st or 2^nd in every race in the series.

It was also the final event in the Midland series, again won by Veronica, and was the penultimate event in the Pinnell & Bax Southern Paddle series.