Saturday was a bleak grey day with the wind blowing some 25 knots with gusts up to 40 knots. Race Officer Andrew Finn, Race Convenor Alistair Fraser and Course Setters Brett Gething and Bruce McCurrach anxiously kept an eye on the barometer, anemometer, flags and white horses.
The start was reviewed every half hour, and eventually the first race began at 13:30, an hour and half late. The rescue boats were kept very busy as capsizes were many and frequent, but four races were squeezed into the afternoon.
Nevertheless there were 69 entrants from the clubs in Knysna, Redhouse, George Lakes and Mossel Bay itching to have a go. Some of the older and wiser, and some of the very young, decided to give it a miss and wait and see. A short course in front of the SANParks building was set with the finish at the club.
This course, with that wind, notwithstanding the many capsizes, did not take very long to sail and thus the four races could be completed on the Saturday afternoon.
Sunday looked a little threatening at first, but by 10:30 all that air blown to the East in the previous Westerly gale, came back, this time as Easterly near-gale, blustering up to 30 knots. Two more races were sailed giving a total of six races.
The outright senior winner was Knysna's Brett Gething (Finn) with six wins. He was followed by Rosey Finn of KYC (Laser 4.7). The third place went to Redhouse's Trevor Kitson (Laser) and the Laser of Knysna's Alastair Fraser came fourth.
KYC's Dudley Isaacs (Finn) could have made it in fifth place, but he elected not to race the last race but instead do a bit of blast reaching for fun. Thus he ended seventh. In the senior multihulls it was a clear win for KYC's Commodore, Chick Ramsay (Hobie 14).
In the juniors, who sail smaller and thus slower boats than the seniors, and therefore are started separately, KYC's Jonathan Rees (Optimist) was the clear winner with four firsts and two seconds. Second was Andre Bredenkamp (RS Tera) from Mossel Bay, third Taryn Butler (RS Tera Sport) from Redhouse, and fourth Jayan Smart (Dabchick) from George Lakes.
In the overall club results, determined by the best five sailors of each club in each individual race, Knysna won, followed by Redhouse, then Mossel Bay and George Lakes was fourth.
In the juniors George Lakes came first, KYC second, Mossel Bay third and Redhouse fourth.
Apart from the sailing fun, the weekend’s entertainment was spot-on with live TV viewing of the Springboks vs Wales match and the good old traditional South African braaing and partying.
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On Saturday afternoon dinghy sails crowed the lagoon, and a lone keelboat ’Bounty’ was caught in the middle.
