Noble Marine Rooster RS400 National Championships at East Lothian Yacht Club - Day 2

Martin Booth and Alan Mclean consult the tactics book © Steve Fraser

Martin Booth and Alan Mclean - 2022 Noble Marine Rooster RS400 National Championships, day 2 © Steve Fraser

While the rockstars were smashing it at the front of the fleet the real excitement was to found in bitterly fought battles in the Bronze fleet between 30th and 35th places.

Totally baffled by the excellent tactics talk by Jim Sinclair your correspondent and his helm headed out with dreams of glory to be shattered once again by the RS gods.

Big kudos to the marvellous ELYC team who helped launch us into R3 and R4 of the national series. Kite up, sweet westerly winds, sun and the mighty Bass Rock provided a superb backdrop to our first capsize on the way to the start due to user error. Damp but unbowed we arrived at the line with five minutes to spare and a desire to dominate the bottom third of the bronze fleet, by any means necessary.

Following the start script to the letter we were pushed off the line by the big boys and bobbed across in last place. Things could and did only get better as we headed right into wind (and tide) and pulled back half a dozen places at the first windward mark.

Many thanks to Mike and Alan in 1294 for their entertaining capsize at the spreader ensuring another place gained for us. They enjoyed it so much they had another capsize in R4. Hester and Richard (1148) and Andy and Robert (Pink Panther 1521) provided close racing over the three legs. The third race finished on a close reach in champagne sailing and we were elated to make 29th place.

2022 Noble Marine Rooster RS400 National Championships, day 2 - photo © Steve Fraser

The committee started the fourth race promptly, sticking the knife into Hester and Richard by interrupting their nice quiet lunch and ensuring they were two minutes late for the start. It didn't stop them gaining ten places and finishing 25th overall.

Dropping wind compressed the fleet at the first mark and we caught the silver fleet who tried to look cool and pretended to welcome us. It was nice to sit in the middle of the fleet for a change.

2022 Noble Marine Rooster RS400 National Championships, day 2 - photo © Steve Fraser

On the second reach we found small corridor of brisk wind and enjoyed a vastly entertaining screaming port tack reach through the grown-ups on starboard who seemed very upset. Someone threatened a protest so we threw in a 360 which lost us about five places but racing remained tight to the end with a glorious victory over Doug and Bruce in 1195 who had snatched a place from us the previous day.

The ELYC beach team provided muscle to bring us up the sand. A fabulous day's racing by the oldest boat in the fleet and looking forward to more tomorrow.

Results after day 2:

2022 Noble Marine Rooster RS400 National Championships, day 2 - photo © Steve Fraser