Tuesday, May 21, 2013

J/97 Rescues Sailor- Royal Southern Regatta

J's sailing on Solent, off Cowes, England (Hamble, Hampshire, UK)- Capping a class-winning racing performance with a piece of impressive, no-nonsense seamanship in rescuing an MOB from another boat counts as a pretty good day on the water.  Adam Munday is in the process of applying for Academy membership at the Royal Southern Yacht Club. On the basis of his performance in the Club's May Regatta, the first in their annual Summer Series, it's not unreasonable to think he may be a shoo-in!

In Saturday's racing, run by the Royal Southampton Yacht Club and incorporating its prestigious Clarkson Cup Regatta, Adam posted three bullets in IRC3 as skipper of the J/97 INDULJENCE. Then in Sunday's first race, the 20 year-old and his crew were, thankfully, in the right place at the right time.

"We were slightly behind Jeopardy 2 and they Chinese-gybed," said Adam. "We spotted someone in the water- we thought it was a girl. We were in the right place and we could see Jeopardy was in a bit of trouble trying to retrieve their kite so we dropped ours and went back upwind to her. I think she was in the water for about five minutes. The crew behaved really well and it all went quite smoothly," he added.

Conditions at the time of the incident were typical of the regatta on each day, a building breeze and an increasingly lumpy sea, particularly when tide turned against westerly wind in the course of racing.

Jeopardy 2's female crew was transferred back to her yacht by the Southern's mark-laying RIB Sir Michael, seemingly none the worse for her experience in water as apparently it was "not as cold as she'd expected".

INDULJENCE received redress for her rescue and, with a further win in the last race, took IRC3 ahead of David Greenhalgh's J/92 J'RONIMO and Andy Howe's J/92S BLACKJACK.  Sailing Photo & story credit to- Phil Riley.   For more Royal Southern YC Series sailing information