Team Osborne wins BYC Club Championship

From the Crews’ Union:

On what must have been one of the best weekends weather wise this summer, nine of Beaconsfield Yacht Club’s finest, which included a Niagara 26, four Tanzer 22’s and four Sharks, sailed out to do battle on Saturday, September 16th in the Annual Club Championship Regatta. This invitation only event featured BYC sailors who qualified by their performance at local events through the summer.

Beautiful sunshine, warm weather and an eight to ten knot breeze welcomed in the first race at 12:30pm. Gold Cup courses were the order of the day. A significant wind shift just before the start meant that those who had picked the pin end of the line were hot out of the gate! The Tanzer 22 team skippered by John Linton was first out of the blocks and held the lead with excellent boat speed around the windward mark. The white sail format was a change/challenge for a number of competitors, and wing & wing sailing was the order of the day on the offwind legs. Jin Fratti’s team on Shark #711 were in second with the Osborne Shark team in third. Things tightened up considerably for the top three on the off-wind legs and all three rounded at close quarters. A favourable shift on the left hand side of the course allowed Team Osborne to round the windward mark just ahead of Team Linton. The dead run to the finish line was a battle, with the masthead genoa of the Tanzer looming large over the fractional rig of the Shark. Linton crossed the finish line four seconds ahead of Osborne, finishing second after the handicaps were applied. Team Fratti finished third.

The second race saw Team Osborne lead from wire to wire. The battle in this race was for second where once again, it was a Tanzer and a Shark dueling on the final leg, a dead run – sans spinnaker. Once again, the offwind advantage went to the Tanzer, with Linton finishing second and Fratti third.

The third and final race proved to be the most intense, with lots of action around the leeward mark!! Team Benedetti in the Niagara 26, showed incredible speed and sailed away from the pack on the first beat. It would be a lead that not relinquished. Team Langeder in Tanzer 22 Breezin’ were the second team around the windward, with Linton, Fratti, Teams Gilbertson and Paynter (both in T22’s) all in a tight pack. The two offwind legs were a parade – making for a very interesting meeting at the leeward mark.
A rather quick flip onto starboard immediately upon rounding led to some raised voices, a little bumping and a lot of congestion. When the smoke had cleared, Team Osborne had crept up from seventh place into second, steering wide of the commotion and maintaining boat speed.

The Niagara crossed the line first; with Team Osborne crossing second and winning the championship with three first place finishes on corrected time. Team Linton finished second and Team Fratti rounded out the podium.
The racing was very tight and all teams are to be congratulated. The Crews’ Union would be remiss if we did not congratulate BYC Sailing Chairman Ben Waring, and Club Manager David Speak on an outstanding job of race management.

CU