Alistair Tyrrell

30 October 2016 Sadly it was the last race of the year today, and an early departure for a 1030 start. Jonny was with me for the first time and we found a fairly steady F2 from the East. Five boats came out to race. Dick tried to get the race off a few minutes early as we were all milling around out there ready to go, but the start was a bit chaotic due to several getting caught by the tide and general confusion around the gate start so he had to abort the start and do the countdown all over again. On the restart we were pleased to be first away and began a long beat to Steel Can out to the east, beating into the easterly wind and into the tide. All boats seem to determine that the best course was to tack quite close inshore to keep away from the worst of the tidal current, the GPS smartphone track log below illustrates what we did. Jonny was on the helm and seemed to be enjoying it. We felt like we were almost inside the beach huts at one point but we were probably several metre...

16 Oct 2016 Nine boats took part in the up / down river race this year, and three RIBs of volunteer helpers. The morning began with wet and blustery conditions but the forecast was promising so the nine boats were towed up to the grassy bank above Arundel and were beached on the bank so the masts could be stepped and boats rigged. The sun had come out by now though the winds were gusty and variable around F4.  The first race up to the Black Rabbit pub got under way in good order at 1145 but the smaller boats struggeld to overcome the current and only the five bigger boats completed the course. Race officer Nick Clare had timed it well with the tide so we had plenty of time for lunch at the pub, other AYC members had arrived on foot or by road so we had a good sized group sitting outside in the autumn sunshine while we watched for the tide to begin to turn.  We were ready to race back down the river by 1345. All nine boats completed ...

2 Oct 2016 A nice bright day today though the gentle northerly wind was a bit cool. Susi was with me, we attempted to back out of the berth but got stuck aground on a bit of shallow mud behind me - that's never happened before! 20 turns on the keel handle to wind it up a bit, and a burst of reverse on the outboard and we were through and out OK. I have been talking to sail-makers about a new mainsail and they'd all looked at photos of Elsa and noted we hadn't got a luff downhaul properly rigged. We took a moment in the river today, after the usual mainsail hoisting, to rig a bit of line through an eye in the main and tweak the luff edge down tight. Five cruisers motored out into the sunshine about 1100 and the race officer, noting the northerly wind, found it hard to set a course giving us a beat into wind on the first leg. We'd all be up the beach. So he set a line start with a reach out to the weather station as the first leg. This meant a bit of a tricky start ...

18 Sept 2016 Georgia was with me and she helmed most of the way, we raised £85 in sponsorship so thanks to everyone who chipped in. More photos now added as the local photographer was out and about among the fleet. Five cruisers went to sea for the race. Getting out of the river was exciting enough alongside all the dinghies, some under sail and some being towed, as well as the usual river traffic, crossing the 'washing machine' (the bit at the river mouth where the current and tide meet in a swirling eddy) was tricky in the thick of all that!  Our start was ten minutes after the dinghies so we tried to hold off away from the line and enjoyed the spectacle of 40-odd boats milling around, the sky was bright and the sea was nice and flat with the gentle northerly wind. The wind kept shifting and dying and only Dancer got the start dead right, others found themselves well down-wind and down-tide as the wind fell away right in the middle of our ...

3 Sept 2016 Three cruisers signed on for the Ladies Race on Saturday. Former member Dani was with Ron on Cabre, Georgia was on Elsa, and Lily-Beth Gibbs was at the helm of Ayella (their first race since arriving from Exeter last week). Colleagues in the training team had helpfully laid two sea marks as a start / finish line and the three cruisers set off into a SWly F4 and a moderate sea.  On the long beat out to Omar, Cabre was ahead of Elsa, both with single reefed mainsails. Ayella was under genoa only and then retired. As the two remaining boats set off on a broad reach towards the weather station, Cabre noted that Elsa was overhauling them so they turned into wind for a couple of minutes to shake their reef out, which allowed Elsa to get ahead and around the weather station in first place. Positions were unchanged after a short closehauled leg back to Outfall but on the broad reach back to the finish line Cabre’s tactics began to pay off as she drew closer under full sa...

31 August 2016 I'm probably not going to lift the boat out this winter, will leave it till next year when I understand we're dredging the marina so we'll all have to come out. However, with some time off work and fair weather, I decided to beach Elsa on the club slipway so I could wash and paint the bottom. I took some time over preceding days to dig out the beaching legs and plan how to do this. Georgia came to help me and the only complication was that we found some other club guys also beaching the committee boat for urgent prop repairs. But we all fitted in. Elsa's legs are wooden with a single bolt that goes through a hull fitting, and guy ropes fore and aft from the foot of each leg. The existing bolts were rusted so I worked them out and bought shiny new ones. On the day these turned out to be 5mm too short so some spares had to be found from the club tool-shed but with me aboard Elsa, Georgia in a RIB beside me, and assorted club members to throw ropes...

7 Aug 2016 Due to concerns about silting and channel depth at Brighton, the annual cruiser race to Brighton became a race to Shoreham instead. Georgia was with me and we set off at 1200 Saturday keen to have a good race by starting as early as we could. Behind, we saw the other six boats leaving the river close behind us. As usual Georgia was well prepared with several bags of picnic. There was a nice westerly F3 so with full sail we crossed the start line at 1233 and headed for Shoreham. The strong breeze kept the sails full but the following sea made Elsa a bit tricky to handle, she wasn't stable enough to goosewing. Behind us the fleet spread out, some with spinnakers, some falling back. We found ourselves slightly too far south so gybed around towards the shore for a few minutes near Worthing then back on course east. Hard work but a pleasant trip and we found the finish point (one of Sussex YC's marks) and completed the race at 1424. The genoa fur...