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RC Laser Off The Wall Trophy Blackwater Sailing Club - Day 2
6 February 2010By Ian Barratt 07 Feb 2010 08:49
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MALCOLM HUTCHINGS retained the form he displayed a fortnight ago with an impressive two-point victory in the second event of HDRC (Humpty Dumpty Radio Club) Burnham’s Off The Wall Trophy series at Blackwater Sailing Club on Saturday.
With still over a month to go before the end of the six-event series, it is already beginning to look as though the final outcome could prove to be a close-fought affair.
Currently, Hutchings, who is looking for his first-ever overall victory in five years of HDRC racing, heads the table after two events, three points ahead of Saturday’s runner-up Ian Milton, who has won the club’s previous two series.
A promising start by Peter Payne (fifth and third after two events) puts him a further two points back with four events remaining, but hot-shots Phil Newman, Peter Hutchings, Nick Milton and Keith Musto, all of whom have missed one event, may have a crucial say in the final outcome once the discard has been taken into consideration.
Hutchings’ consistency was marginally better than that of Milton. He scored two more victories than his chief rival, and one less second place, while both had a worst finish of fifth. In the end, however, the final four races proved crucial, Hutchings outscoring Milton with a 1-1-2-1 to a 2-2-1-2.
For the second successive event it was an A rig day, the only difference being that the wind piped up later in the afternoon. And for the first time for many weeks the event was blessed with glorious sunshine.
With one exception, races were dominated by windward-leeward courses, with a longer beat on the first lap in order to help split up the fleet and reduce the usual congestion at the first mark. The wind strength was for the most part ideal for A rigs, though a few gusts later on caused some involuntary nosedives.
There was a considerable amount of covering throughout the fleet and some interesting wind shifts led to plenty of place changes - though some, rather bizarrely, were due to going aground on the launching ramp!
Day 2 (of 6) results:
1 - M Hutchings - 16 pts
2 - I Milton - 18 pts
3 - P Payne - 29 pts
Overall to date:
1 - M Hutchings - 3 pts
2 - I Milton - 6 pts
3 - P Payne - 8 pts
More Information:
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