Morgan Cup, results for WINSOME

June 19, 2010

June 11th, this friday we had all day to prepare the Old Lady for a trip to France. We were going to Cherbourg! The land of croissants, wine and baquets. Last year at the end of the season WINSOME won a race to Cherbourg, so spirits were high. Spirits were just as high as the airpressure above the Solent. Three to five knots of wind and the tide swept us out of the Solent on friday evening. Not the ideal conditions for WINSOME. Leen was steering and Harry was navigating. The Deckman equipment has less and less secrets for Harry. Today Robert was onboard. Robert works for B & G and knows Deckman inside out. It was great to have him with us this trip, not only did he help us with Deckman, he also was a welcome hand on deck! This left Joost D and Joost H to trim some sails, together with Alexander and Jan.

The race course was 130 miles, enought miles for the wind to fill in. During the night we were suprised by a sudden squall while reaching under spinaker. It was not possible to get the kite down in time which resulted in a torn sail (sorry Andy). During the early hours of saturday morning we rounded the last bouy of the English coast and headed for Cherbourg together with Foggy Dew and Psipsina. Sixteen knots of wind, 60 miles of downwind sailing, clear blue skies: champagne sailing. At the end of the day we arrived in Cherbourg, approximately 30 – 40 minutes after Foggy Dew and Psipsina. The conditions were ideal for these two yachts, surfing to Cherbourg. WINSOME has many qualities, surfing however is not one of them. We finished third in IRC 2, a bit to our suprise as we expected to finish 5th, especially in these conditions. So after a couple of French beers we turned WINSOME around and motorsailed her back to Cowes, by now the wind had completely gone. We were happy with the reuslts and enjoyed another great weekend of the English coast.

Next weekend WINSOME will be sailing again, this time the JP Morgan Round the Island Race (www.roundtheisland.org.uk).

Bon Vents,

Joost