RS Sailing RS200 Northern Tour Round 4 at Yorkshire Dales Sailing Club

RS200s at Yorkshire Dales © Paul Hargreaves Photography

RS200s at Yorkshire Dales © Paul Hargreaves Photography

The fourth event of Rope4Boats and RS Sailing sponsored tour was hosted by Yorkshire Dales Sailing Club over the weekend of 3rd/4th June. This event also acted as the Northern event in the RS200 National Series, so it was disappointing to have only one out of area boat visiting in the shape of past National Champions Matt Mee & Emma Norris, who hail from the North and were combining the sailing with seeing family.

Conditions were pretty much ideal with a force 3-5 wind westerly blowing down the length of the reservoir both days.

In these conditions, Ollie Groves & Esther Parkhurst tend to dominate on the Northern Tour, so it was of some interest to see how the young pretenders would fare against the experience and known form of Matt & Emma.

As might have been expected, it was these two boats that dominated proceedings all weekend. The first race proceeded with multiple general recalls before the Race Officer, Ian Escritt, broke out the black flag, something that wasn't going to disappear all weekend.

In the first race Matt & Emma and Ollie & Esther pulled clear of the fleet on the first beat and finished in that order with Matt Bromley & Faye Caswell showing a welcome return to form with a third place.

The second race saw much of the same with Matt & Emma winning comfortably from Ollie & Esther with Martin Penty & Tim Waller taking third.

RS200s at Yorkshire Dales - photo © Paul Hargreaves Photography

The final race of the day proved more interesting as the wind shifted south westerly just before the start meaning a lot of boats including Matt & Emma having to tack back onto port to get across the line. Ollie & Esther made a great start and sailed into a comfortable lead, whilst Matt & Emma were in recovery mode. For the first couple of laps Ollie & Esther looked comfortable in first, only for Matt & Emma to pick a better route downwind on the third lap to sneak the win. Matt & Faye took another third to leave them in third position overall overnight.

Three more back to back races were sailed on Sunday.

The fourth race saw Matt & Emma pull ahead to take first from Ollie & Esther in second and Martin & Tim taking third.

The fifth race saw Ollie & Esther take an early lead from Matt & Emma, a lead they weren't to relinquish. Matt & Emma finished second with Martin & Tim picking up a third place.

RS200s at Yorkshire Dales - photo © Paul Hargreaves Photography

Matt & Emma had now won the event with four firsts and a second, so didn't need to sail the final race. This left Ollie & Esther to take a convincing win. Sam Waller and Lewis had a good final race to finish second with Martin & Tim showing great consistency with their third third of the day. This was sufficient for Martin & Tim to take third overall with Matt & Faye two points further back in fourth and Sam & Lewis two points further back in fifth.

Tim will be satisfied to have had the last laugh in the battle of the Wallers after being 'sacked' by Sam (or so he was claiming).

Matt was very gracious in his speech saying that it was a long time since they had been pushed as hard as they were by Ollie & Esther, who are becoming more consistent with each event and will surely be pushing the Southern boats at the Nationals and Inlands later in the season.

This event was probably the first time on the Northern Tour there were more youth sailors than oldies with five all youth boats and only three oldies out there; there were also five other boats with youth crews. This really bodes well for the future of the class in the North.

Many thanks to Rope 4 Boats and RS Sailing for their series sponsorship and to Mike Saul for providing the club prizes. The Rope4Boats raffle where all entrants have an equal chance of winning vouchers, were won by John Turley and Alistair Scott.

Overall Results: