Alistair Tyrrell

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 sail.