Worlds and Junior Europeans Selector 3
Hayling Island 3-4 May 2003
Once again Hayling Island provided a wonderful sunny weekend the 3rd regatta of the International 420 class selection series for the Worlds Championship this year. On Saturday the 15 knot south westerly wind suited the bigger teams, On Sunday it went round to the southeast and dropped off allowing the smaller crews to move up the rankings. Laurie Fitzjohn Sykes and Jonathan Frazer sailed extremely consistently to win from current series leader Callum Macdonald and Haakon Karlson and Sam Carter and Paul Davies despite not getting in the first 2 places in any race. Pippa Wilson and Harriette Trumble sailed a steady series too, finishing as top girls in 4th place overall.
It took the race officer some time to set the course for the first race. With the good onshore wind there were big waves causing difficulty with getting the marks to stay in place. But the boys loved it with Macdonald and Karlson making their claim to the teams by leading at the first mark and moving steadily away to win from Ben Ainsworth and Tom Heywood. The second race was closer. Luke Patience and Adam Wagner led from the first mark and covered carefully protected their position from Macdonald and Karlson and Fitzjohn Sykes and Frazer who worked themselves into third place again. As the wind eased slightly in the afternoon, different crews came to the front. In race three Sam Carter and Paul Davies , who have been members of the team to the Worlds for the last two years sailed a good race to finish ahead of Ainsworth and Heywood and in race 4 Stuart Bithell and Jonathan McGovern recovered their form of the last meeting to win from Simon Lambert and Chris Evans. Although the rescue boats were kept busy most crews were able to complete all the races. At the end of the day Fitzjohn Sykes and Frazer led by a point from Macdonald and Karlson and Bithell and McGovern with Alison Martin and Bethan Carden leading girls in 10th place.
Sunday started with 9 knots from the south east with a big residual swell from the day before. Charlotte Savage and Maia Walsh won race 5 by a huge margin from Macdonald and Karlson. The wind then backed to the east and dropped a little. Thomas Mallandine and Ross Harvey started well from a port end line and found that left was good to win their first selector race from Savage and Walsh. The same wind pattern held for the next race and again Mallandine and Harvey won, this time from James Goss and Daniel Schieber who used the wind pattern to recover from a poor start and work their way to the front. For the final race the wind picked up again. Savage and Walsh completed a good day with another win from Joanne Macdonald and Laurie Marsden with Pippa Wilson and Harriette Trumble in 3rd.
With such a wide range of conditions it was a high scoring series with consistency of good results in all conditions being the key to finishing at the top of the list.
A team selection for the International 420 World Championships to be held at Hayling this July was announced, With 14 boats in each of the men�s and ladies� events, a large part of the fleet look forward to returning to Hayling this summer. The teams include a wide range of youth and experience and we wish all the competitors, and the club a successful event.