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The weekend of 15-16 June was one of the busiest of the year at the Club with a full programme of Cadet training on the river and the lake as well as Club racing and we also hosted a very successful down river Fireball Open meeting. 11 home boats were joined by 7 visiting boats from 7 different clubs. Competitors enjoyed five races in force 4-6 winds which produced perfect conditions for the heavy weather experts. Despite an OCS in race 1, consistency in the remaining races to count gave Blackwater team of Dave Hall and Paul Constable outright victory. In second place were Peter and Tom Kyne from Brightlingsea and in third place were Isaac Marsh and Squashed Olly from Northampton. For the full results click Fireball Open 2019 Results.pdf

Photos (c) Zoe Nelson

Many congratulations to Blackwater Sailing Club Cadet Joey Taylor and his crew Terry Hacker who have been crowned RS Feva National Champions 2019 in a fleet of 94 boats. A strong contingent from the Club headed to South Caernarvonshire Yacht Club, Abersoch for the 4 day event from 25-28 May. Joey and Terry won the qualifying event and then went on to post an impressive 1,1,2,1,1,1 to become champions an amazing 22 points in front of the second boat! Thanks to fantastic performances from the other BSC sailors, Blackwater also won the prize for the top club. Sophie Johnson and Theo Aers won first mixed crew in 9^th and Nick Evans and Oscar Cawthorne came 14^th. Marnie Aers with Ellie Shelter and Jemima Cook with Abbie Wallace sailed very well to get into the Gold fleet and Ruby Andrews and Sophie Foskett came an impressive 7^th in the Silver fleet.

The RS Feva was only introduced to the club in 2016 so it is remarkable how quickly our cadets have mastered the class and risen to the top. This is testament to the close training collaboration with the Burnham Squiddies and all the hard work and support from their coaches and those at the Club.

Read Joey’s report on the championship RS FEVA Nationals 2019 report - BSC.pdf

Click for the overall  Results

Photos © Andrew Taylor, Digital Photography

Light winds prevailed for our first full training weekend of the year, this gave the perfect opportunity for our new sailors on the lake to gain confidence under the expert tutorage of Nick O’Connor with his new glamourous assistant Kylie Gooch.

After being assigned their nick names for the year the Jolly Sailors made good progress towards their Level 2 badge.

On the river we had good sailing conditions on the Saturday with an unforecast Sea Breeze developed. On the Sunday we were met with a flat calm but the cadets still went out and  managed to get to a Millbeach for an ice cream, the Laser group had fun with no rules racing. All our sailors were rewarded when steady F2 breeze picked up at 2pm which allowed us to get some sailing in for the last hour.

Here’s hoping for stronger winds for our next training weekend on the 15/16^th of June. 

Photos Stephen Foakes, Nikki Taylor and Rob Carver

Congratulations to Club Steward Rob Dean and Club Assistant Zoe Nelson who were honoured by the RNLI at a presentation evening at Maldon Little Ships Club this week. Blackwater Sailing Club got a big thank you from John Rogers for all the support they gave to MLSC by providing RIBS to escort their sponsored Row and Gig race on Saturday 5th January. This popular charity event raised over £10,000 for the RNLI. Rob and Zoe got a special mention for doing a brilliant job laying the marks and keeping the crews safe. Zoe represented BSC at the ceremony and was very proud to accept a special award from the RNLI for her and Rob in recognition of their hard work.  Photos (c) Zoe Nelson

Two weeks after the warmest Easter for years, on Saturday 4^th May we chose the coldest May Bank Holiday on record for our annual Open Day and RYA push the boat out “Try Sailing in May” event. This didn’t deter more than 150 hardy visitors who came along to Blackwater Sailing Club to find out what we can offer. The day dawned dry and sunny, but we decided it was too cold and windy to safely offer our visitors sailing tasters, necessitating a change of plan. Our guests enjoyed tours of the extensive site finishing at our 7-acre training lake. Here many of our cadets and adults were demonstrating their heavy weather and capsize recovery skills. We also ran wet and wild RIB trips around the lake which were enjoyed by all. Before hypothermia had set in, guests were taken to the warm clubhouse where food and warm drinks were consumed. They were then able to watch our intrepid sailors taking part in a club race. The storm clouds built rapidly before the start and winds quickly built to a howling squall with 40 knot gusts which flattened most of the fleet. This quickly passed and returned to a steady force 5-6 and the race was soon underway with some spinnakers flying. Just after the race finished another squall hit causing more spectacular capsizes right in front of the clubhouse. Guests who had thawed out sufficiently took advantage of river trips on the Blackwater in one of our RIBs or the launch. This gave them a close-up view of the action and they all came back with smiles on their faces, if a little wet. We had static demonstrations ashore of the various boats sailed at the club. The membership desks were busy all day and over 20 new members signed up and another 26 took away details with the intention of signing up. A big thank you to the 60+ adult and cadet members who helped out and made this a fun day for our guests and thank you to all the visitors who came.

Photos © Nigel Butler & Zoe Nelson

The Club was the place to be over Easter with unbroken sunshine and cooling onshore breezes. Over 50 boats raced over five days and many more just took to the waters to enjoy a sail. The cadets had a very successful Frostbite series over Thursday to Saturday and on Friday and Saturday there were four races in the Britannia handicap series with long and short courses set. The Friday sailors decided to cruise around Northey on Friday rather than race and they then invaded Maldon from the sea with the intention distributing flyers for our Open Day. Unfortunately, they forgot the flyers so consoled themselves by emptying the ice cream and chip shops.

On Sunday there was general handicap racing and then on Monday the handicap Osea Cup race which this year was a race around Osea Island in the best wind of the holiday period. A steady stream of cruisers launched over the period with some tuning up for the start of the BJRC series next weekend. Many members enjoyed having a sail on the lake in one of the new club Optimists or just watching the Burnham cadets who were training on the lake on Friday and Saturday. Overall a fantastic holiday long weekend and it was great to see so many people enjoying being at the club soaking up the sunshine and sea air.

Photos © Dick Garside

After racing in the Frostbite series 40 cadets and 30 adults spent an enjoyable evening at the club taking part in the Easter Family Supper. Prior to the supper the cadets enjoyed a series of games organised by the cadet committee, these included an obstacle course egg race, pass the plastic cup using straws and a sack race. The Cadet Skipper was narrowly beaten by the Commodore in the sack race who is surprisingly agile for his age, the Deputy Cadet Skipper should have an easier race in two years time against the Vice Commodore.

The games culminated in the Easter Egg Hunt where teams of ravenous cadets roamed the dinghy park looking for the Golden Egg, which was finally found by Ruby Andrews and Rhiannon Webber, who had been tied together to make it easier for the younger cadets. If you find any eggs around the dinghy park can you please drop them off by the notice board.

After prize giving for the Cadet Frostbite Series everybody sat down to a delicious dinner crafted by Master Chef Steff and Sous Chef Alex assisted by Lisa and Sam. The Cadet Committee helped with serving and washing up before heading off to the disco in the Cadet Room.

Photos Kate Stewart and Rob Haigh

The Weather Gods smiled on Blackwater over the Easter Weekend for the Cadet Frostbite Series, with brilliant sunshine and a F2-3 gradient breeze from the NE supplemented in the afternoon by a sea breeze   we had excellent sailing conditions. For the main Frostbite series we had a mixed fleet of 2 Fevas, 4 Teras, 3 Lasers and 2 Toppers. Competing, in the Topper/Tera Regatta fleet we had four boats out and we also had 4 boats in the Optimist fleet.

On Thursday with crack race office Marg Norman in charge we managed to get 4 relatively short races in, with an upwind start between Hilly Pool and Colliers and Don Aers and Simon Shelter policing the line from Red Rib the cadets made good use of the opportunity to get some proper race starts in. For Friday and Saturday the Frostbite Series was combined with the Club Brittania Series and we had two races per day over a longer course.

We must also thank all the adults that helped make the weekend happen, coaching from Mini Ribs, crewing Safety Boats, acting as race officers, helping on the ramp etc. Without you we could not put these events on and your help is invaluable.

Results

Main Series

1^st Place Sophie Johnson / Theo Aers (Feva XL)

2^nd Place Ruby Andrews / Sophie Foskitt (Feva XL)

3^rd Place Aimee Taylor (Laser Radial)

Topper/Tera Regatta

1^st Place Sam Glover (Topper)

2^nd Place Charlie Garlick (Topper 4.2)

3^rd Place Jessica Garlick (Topper)

Optimist

1^st Place Matthieu Bernard

2^nd Place Jessica Welch

3^rd Place Josephine Bernard

Photos Dick Garside, Paul Trickey and Rob Haigh

There have been a few changes down at the lake, the cadet committee last year decided to scrap all the old club Optimists which were starting to look rather tired. We have replaced them with three brand new OptiQubes bought with money from cadet funds. These are the same boats as the cadets train on and will hopefully make sailing on the lake outside of training events a more fun experience.

The weather is looking good for the weekend so let’s get out and use the new boats. I will be down at the club Thursday to Sunday so can offer advice when I am not supervising the Frostbite Series.

Finally a big thank you from all of us to Marg and Drac Norman for braving killer mosquitoes to help set the boats up last night.