The local scene is heating up with GNS A, #Race 1

The racing has begun! Racing began officially with the first Good Neighbour Series A race on May 27th, and I joined the fun with last night's Award Series. The weather is supposed to be hot, hot, hot this coming week end, and the racing is quickly raising the mercury too.

The first race May 27th was a drag race up and down the course with the wind coming from the side of the course. Gawd, I'm soooo glad I wasn't doing race committee! I feel for whoever was. A course that ends up being wrong for the wind direction is a nightmare for amateur race officers, and may cause paralyzing dismay! Nevertheless, even drag races can demand certain talents of skipper and crew. Poor boatspeed cannot be made up for with a well calculated couple of tacks. So, with applause, here are the toppers from different fleets for May 27th.

The Etchells in PHRF 1&2 were a little spread apart with Dick Steffen's team first over, followed by Vivace, Pierre Jasmin's team, and then Keith Mathews. They had a pretty good turn out for the first spring counter race with 5 boats, including Brian Palfreeman and Luc Gloutney's boats.

Two J24s and Moonraker, the Niagara 26 were also fighting it out as the PHRF 2 contestants.

In PHRF 3, it was obvious that stronger winds played a role with the finish stats as Sharks dominated. Way out in front of the Shark pack was Don Osborne and Nick Van Haeften's Shark, finishing about 2 and a half minutes ahead of the nearest boat. Wow, hail the Big Wind Meisters! No wonder they have re-named their boat VO2 Max! Following in succession were the Sharks Eclipse, Blue Shark, and Kaos.

A big bravo goes to Erica And Richard Moore who led the Tanzer brigade around the course in their Mirage 24! It must have felt very good to have that wind in their sails, and tame it to come out ahead. 4 Tanzers participated in the windy drag race. In order they were Jake Fichten's Sine Wave, Evergreen, Sorceress, and Encore Une Fois.

In the White Sail fleet, Sawiki, the Grampian 26 quickly asserted its oft-position as pack leader, followed by a Bruce Vinebeg who is now sailing a Northstar 26, and Ptarmigan, the classic and pretty C&C Corvette. 7 boats raced.

Hey, two game Fireballs made it out onto the cool and breezy waters. Just one finished, but they both got a fun head start on the fleet.