RS500 Rooster National Tour - Inland Championships - 2025

Unfortunate diary clashes restricted the RS500 entry to the Grafham Water SC Skiff Challenge, which doubled up as the RS500 Inland championships on the weekend of 28/29 June.  The 500s made up only 4 of the 30 entries, but we punched above our weight in the overall results.  The forecast for the Saturday was 16 knots, gusting 23 and 26 degrees, with much lighter winds on the Sunday, but these turned out to be underestimates in both ways.  The format was 4 shortish back-to-back races on each day on a windward/leeward course.  The B14 fleet had their own start, and then the other fleets had a handicap fleet start.

The whitecaps on the waves looked suspiciously more than 16 knots, but the shore is quite sheltered in a South Westerly at Grafham, so we all thought it looked like a nice moderately breezy sail as we launched.  By the time we got to the committee boat we thought, oh, we must be in one of those 23 knot gusts, cos it’s blowing pretty hard out here.  Suffice to say, that was about as low as the wind dipped for the next three hours, with some pretty big gusts up into the high 20s at various points (usually at the gybe point!).

A relatively low proportion of the total number of entrants finished even one race, but the 500s all completed two, and three of us did all four.  Although the wind was strong, it was still quite shifty, and it was very easy to gain or lose significant distances upwind, particularly as the wind strength didn’t encourage frequent tacking.  Peter and James Curtis used their top weight status to good effect and generally had the best speed upwind; although with the big shifts they didn’t always get to the top mark first.  Downwind was an absolute blast, and comparing GPS tracks afterwards we all had top speeds in the high 18s and low 19s knots.  Peter and James had the edge in the strongest winds, but the very slight lessening of strength in the fourth race saw Bob and Isla Preston and Mike Saul and Olly Kent keeping the Curtis boys honest.  Bob and Isla actually rounded the top mark first on the last lap, but James hoisted a bit faster, letting them roll Bob and Isla who were then forced to gybe off onto what proved to be the unfavoured side of the run.

Final places were repeated in each race, with Mike and Olly not always keeping the mast pointing upwards, and thus losing out in a couple of close battles they were having with Bob and Isla.  Nigel and Aaron Davis enjoyed their racing, but called it a day after a long capsize between races 2 and 3.  After a good meal and much socialising we all had a really good sleep.

The forecast for Sunday varied between light and sailable to virtually nothing from any which way, depending which model you believed.  We launched in the former, but by the time we were at the committee boat it had turned into the latter.  We waited around a bit, then went ashore and waited around a bit more, until racing was canned around lunchtime.

Many thanks to Nigel Denchfield and all the volunteers at Grafham for putting on a great event and turning the races round really swiftly on the Saturday, and for trying to get a race in on the Sunday.

Peter Curtis

Results were:

1^st - Peter and James Curtis - 3 points

2^nd - Bob and Isla Preston - 6 points

3^rd - Mike Saul and Olly Kent - 9 points

4^th - Nigel and Aaron Davis - 13 points

Sorry no photos - the safety crew were too busy!