Salcombe delivered a fantastic weekend away racing to an enthusiastic band of 15 RS Aeros to enjoy the end of summer after a disrupted season for the Class' 2020 South Western Championships. Wonderful blue skies and a medium breeze created great well matched racing. Whilst the northerly wind was unusual it lined up nicely to funnel down Salcombe's ria valley creating a nice windward leeward course through the various angles of the harbour. 

 

At this year's s UK AGM the Class agreed to re-open discussion and trialling of the prototype RS Aero 6 rig to gauge reaction and feedback from a good cross section of sailors. Three RS Aero 6s raced at Salcombe within the mixed RS Aero fleet on a Class recommended PY and had good racing both against each other and as a close match with the RS Aero 7s

 

Salcombe Yacht Club had selected a nice neap high tide weekend and whilst the current was ever present it remained relatively well behaved and the fleet enjoyed a good period of quite slack water during the turn. As ever, and especially at Salcombe, variety is everything!

 

Local Salcombe supremo, Tim Fells, has won Salcombe's Merlin week. He, together with local Solo sailor, Alister Morley, were always ones to watch carefully as they repeatedly darted away from the pack for gains as the frequent opportunities arose. The well versed RS Aero sailors combatted the local knowledge with speed and gear changes. Greg Bartlett (Starcoss) and Peter Barton (Lymington) edged ahead on the long beat towards Kingsbridge whilst the lighter Chris Hatton (Bowmoor) charged back through with his legendary downwind comebacks. 

 

A couple of course errors and a capsize cost Greg dearly. Alister and Peter carelessly cost themselves their discards with a premature start on Salcombe's challenging start line. Ultimately Peter piped Chis by just 2 points whilst Alister, ever present near the front and learning the RS Aero quickly, took third.

 

First RS Aero 6 was Andrew (Spike) Daniels (Hayling) in 4th overall. As a slightly smaller sailor he enjoyed the RS Aero 6 and in Saturday's slightly less patchy conditions he scored a 1,3 on PY before slipping a little on Sunday. Caitlin Atkin (Starcross) beat Caroline Driscoll for the ladies award, whilst Tim Fells made experience count to win the Masters title in 6th.

 

Thank you to Salcombe Yacht Club for their effort to retain our popular event during a difficult period. All the sailors were hugely grateful for a nice weekend racing at their enchsanting venue and look forward to returning again next year.

 

Next up for the UK RS Aeros is the UK Inland Championship at Draycote on 10/11th Oct. This includes the re-scheduled RS Aero 9 UK Nationals and both UK Masters and Ladies titles too. It looks set to be a big weekend with 87 RS Aeros now pre-entered, including a nice fleet of 22 RS Aero 9s. 

 

Check out Paul Gibbins Photography and Sophie Mackley for their fantastic photos of the event. Hi-res copies are available for purchase.