North East Travellers at Hartlepool

The second of this Trident-UK sponsored series was held at Tees and Hartlepool Yacht Club in bright sunshine, a brisk wind and not too big a swell.

About 20 sailors launched some of the Toppers wisely reefing down. Four Toppers from South Shields, Philip Richardson, Eve English, Peter Logg and Chris Harland dominated the first race and finished in that order putting the Tynemouth ES200 with Philip Murray and Matthew Ayres into fifth place. Joric Gebhard of Derwent Reservoir was thrilled with his performance and eventually won the best under 12-year-old prize.

The second race was back to back and the ES200 shot off displaying more controlled spinnaker handling with strong competition from a home club Fireball sailed by Michael Early with Ian Nicholls crewing. Michael had spent many hours of time during the winter restoring the boat and his hard work was well rewarded by the fun they had in this event, and there is the rest of the summer ahead. Lower down the fleet, the young sailors, Jake Gebhard, Derwent and Luke Austin, Hartlepool, were enjoying the conditions and the challenge, English won on handicap from the RS with the other Topping behind.

The third race after lunch saw a very determined English sailing to win. Hartlepool sailors began to show their mettle in this race. Michael Lord in a Laser Radial, used the tide to his advantage and Matthew Pounder, Topper, sailed hard to keep Kneale Brown and Ruth Hutchinson from South Shields behind him.

Results: 1 Eve English, Topper, South Shields SC; 2 Philip Richardson, Topper, SSC; 3 Philip Murray and Matthew Ayres , RS 200, Tynemouth SC; 4 Peter Logg, Topper, SSC; 5 Chris Harland, Topper, SSSC; 6 Michael Lord, Laser Radial, Tees and Hartlepool; 7 Kneale Brown, Topper, SSC; 8 Matthew Pounder, Topper, Tees and Hartlepool.