Crew Wanted for Sunday November 14th

If you are looking to crew an FF tomorrow, quickly contact Adam Mangan!

Are Andy and Nadia losing their (silver) Touch?!

I've just heard that Andy and Nadia have lost their Silver Title!!!

The new winners of the Silver Trophy in the Summer Series are Richard and David Stenson! Hurrah for our newcomer team....!!!!

("Come on, Nadia !!!!!!"...)

Summer Series Results

The winners of the Summer Series, which ended at the end of September were:-

1st. Mark and Tony
2nd. John and Helen
3rd. Dominic and David

Well done to the winners! Mark and Tony keep the Trophy for another year! (more polishing Tony!)

Prizegiving at the AGM after sailing on the 28th!

Y&Y December Issue - The Nationals Attendance Tables

This months Yachts and Yachting magazine has just popped through the door. It's the time of year that they review all dinghy classes. As always, it is so frustrating that they don't include the Flying Fifteen in the tables - they classify it as a "yacht" not a dinghy. The article starts off with an analysis of National Championship attendance figures for the last decade. It makes pretty interesting reading.
Of 134 classes, only 24 classes made 'the cut' - with more than 50 entries in this year's National Championships.
- of the 24, 19 are non trapeze boats, 5 have trapeze. The top 11 classes are all non-trapeze.
- only two of the 24 were designed after 2000, and about half were designed before 1970 and half since
- two of the 24 are Laser designs (Radial and 2000)
- three are RS designs (RS Feva, RS200, RS400)
- interesting absentees ? Fireball, 505, the other RS's, Laser, Laser 4000
- youth classes of Optimist and Topper are way out front with 300+ entries
So where would the Flying Fifteen fit in the league table?
- the answer is at number 17, with 63 entries
- two less entries than the Merlin Rocket
- one more entry than Dart 18
- three more entries than RS400
Y&Y also score if you had more or less boats than in 2000 and 2009.
Only 12 of the 24 listed managed more entries in 2010 than in both 2000 and 2009.
If the Flying Fifteen were listed, it would have been one of them.
Yachts and Yachting on sale at your bookstall now - £4.30
Not bad.......

Summer Series Prizegiving

The prizegiving for the 2010 summer series will take place at the Fleet AGM after sailing on November 28th.

Better be there!!

Datchet loan boat programme

We have two loan boats and they rely on our generous ff members for sails and we shall need replacements in the new year.    Have you any old ones cluttering up your garage?

 

Please email me, Mike Firth, on mike_firth@bluebottle.com

Winter Members!!

We've already heard from both Ian Linder and Matt Glasgow that they'll be bringing their boats to race at Datchet this winter.

If you know anyone else who would be interested in racing with us until March, the Club has a choice of four advantageous FF packages available. You can download a one page leaflet with all the details by visiting the "downloads" section of the fleet website. (click on the right hand side of this Blog)

Sent from my iPhone

Race Start Time on Remembrance Sunday

It's Remembrance Day this coming Sunday - remember that the gun for the first race will not be until just after 1100am.

National Fleet Captains' Meeting 2010

This year, the main focus of the National Fleet Captains' Meeting was about supporting Clubs and Club Racing.

Datchet made a written submission to the Meeting. You can download it by going to the Fleet Website (Click on the panel at the right of the blog)
and selecting the "Downloads" page. You will see it there.

Datchet was represented at the meeting by Mike Firth and Adam Mangan. They'll be happy to talk to you about it.

Fleet AGM

We're thinking we should have our 2010 Fleet AGM after sailing on Sunday 28th November.

The agenda would include:-

- Minutes of Last Meeting (if we can find them!)

- Treasurer's Report (IP)

- Fleet Captain's Report on the the Year (RJ)

- National Fleet Captain's Meeting (MF & AM)

- Marketing our Fleet

Statistics from 5 years of the Loan Boat Program (MF)

Marketing Online, Website etc (RJ)

- Appointment of new Fleet Officers (RJ)

- Any Other Business

Bids for additional topics to Richard please.....

Racing - Sunday November 7th

Good turnout today - 6 boats raced - FC and Howard, The Millar Team, Roger sailing Midnight with John Hanson, Adam without Emma but with a new crew for the winter, plus the two most regular starters, the Stensons and the Humes....

Adam's new crew, Tim, looks a handy piece of work - obviously not up to Emma's massive Gaelic charm (no swimsuit days to look forward to here...), but pretty useful in a breeze, I'd say.

It was the first cool sailing day of the autumn but a nice non-planing breeze.  We had around 10mph gusting maybe 15mph, so just the odd bit of fun and spray.  It was definitely a double thermals kind of day (6 degrees) - we had a pretty unusual northerly direction to the breeze, with some jolly massive shifts.  Gave up on the tactick mullarkey....

The FC had returned from his holiday in Windermere.  We are told that he persuaded his wife that it would be a perfect place for an autumn break.  It just so happened that they were two minutes walk from the base and sail-loft of a certain well known Flying Fifteen Champion...  Wifely comment on this chicanery is not recorded.  ("It is in our house" - Ed.) She should have guessed something was up when they hitched up the Fifteen for the journey.  Completely baffled at their new turn of speed, Richard and Howard just took off in 3934 and left the fleet for dead in both races.  That's three wins out of four starts for them.  Of course, there was nobody named Firth competing which makes a giant difference, obviously!!  Racing was very close in the Fleet though - in the first race 90 seconds separated 2nd, 3rd and 4th places and in the second race just 30 seconds separated the same three !!!

Team Millar were sailing exceptionally well - they have got to grips with their new mast and had a really convincing 2nd in the second race after a great tussle with the Humes.

XFC appeared for coffee, sounded more cheerful, adjusted the spreader settings here and there and inspected the FF part of the boat park and 3888 in particular.  I have never had to face an Ofsted inspection but it must be somewhat similar - that feeling that one could do much better if one tried only a little harder!!

Water level still disturbingly unmoved.

The New Fleet Website

We've designed a new website for the fleet aimed at newcomers to both Flying Fifteens and to sailing. Take a look and see what you think. Lets us know.....

http://web.me.com/rjlondon/ffdatchet/Flying_Fifteen_Welcome.html

The Europeans at La Rochelle

You probably all know that FC and XFC tugged 3181 all the way down to La Rochelle for towing practice.

It was a pretty good regatta it seems - the photo here taken on the Friday is our favourite.  It's not FC and XFC I can reveal here.....!!

Photo is copyright: Francois Richard
email him at francois.richard.photo@gmail.com
if you'd like to see more.

Datchet Buoy can also reveal that if they hadn't swapped trailers for the event, all hell would have broken loose. Admiral Firth used said same trailer for the Llangorse Open and had to have it welded back together in a Supermarket car park.  Waitrose think of everything....

New Boats in the Fleet

Not only have Steve Bell and Simon Scullion bought a Flying Fifteen this year - and a carbon one at that ...  but now Datchet Man can reveal that we have another new boat - Mervyn Wright has bought the poetically numbered 3535. The only boat in our fleet that rhymes......  Next up : David and Richard Stenson, we hope. That'll be three for the year !!