Eight boats raced in the second weekend of the Cookham Reach Sailing Club Winter Series in some challenging conditions for all. The sailors agreed that the wind conditions were difficult to sail in with winds changing regularly between very light winds from the west of around 5mph increasing up to 15mph with heavily shifting gusts over 20mph. The wind direction caused winds to be lighter at the Cookham Bend with a significant dead zone in the middle of the course. The race officer, Ken Fidler assisted by Christine Roy and Clive Church set a course with a skewed start line at the OD box, the sailors tacked to the B buoy positioned on the Berkshire bank at the Cookham Bend taken to starboard, then across to the Buckinghamshire bank to the D buoy taken to the port buoy. The A buoy was positioned at the top of the course, downstream of the fallen tree and taken to port and then the sailors sailed downwind and downstream to the C buoy positioned downstream of the club half way between the club and Cookham Bridge, the C buoy was taken to port requiring a jybe to round it. This buoy caused some issues for the sailors due to the strength of the wind in the lower part of the course.
Seven sailors took the start and Martin Evans (LN 150) and Jerome Dreux (OK 2007) made the best starts leading the rest of the sailors away. The wind direction meant that sailors could take different tacking lines to try and reach the first buoy first, Martin led around the buoy with Jerome and James Long (OK 1990) rounding the buoy together after Jerome had sailed up the Berkshire bank and James sailing across to the buoy from Bucks bank. Maddie Harris (LN 279), Clive Evison (LN 431), Nick Reuter (L 125425) and Duncan Watts (LN 431) were just behind. At the bend, the sailors discovered that the wind was considerably lighter on the upper part of the course and they struggled to sail at close haul up the course, with varying winds meaning some needed to tack back out into the middle of the river to make it up to the A buoy. At the buoy Martin now had a healthy lead with James second, Jerome third and the rest just behind. James collided with the buoy whilst rounding it and dropped back to fifth after serving his 360 penalty which was difficult due to the light winds. In the lower part of the course the wind picked up and Martin rounded the bottom buoy first and led across the line with Jerome catching in second, Maddie third and James fourth. The rest were spread out behind and Gary Adshead (OK 1998) joined the race a lap down.
The wind dropped on the second lap and Martin extended his lead considerably on the second lap with some good sailing in the light winds with the sailors holding the same positions behind. On the third lap, James got into trouble in a gust near the C buoy and dropped to the back of the pack, Clive took Maddie for third, Duncan fifth and Nick sixth. On the penultimate lap, the wind picked up and Maddie started to catch Clive with them separated by five seconds as they crossed the line to start the final lap. On the final lap, she passed Clive for third place and closed in on Jerome finishing two seconds behind at the finish, with Martin winning almost three minutes. Clive finished fourth, Duncan fifth and behind James closed in on Nick on the final lap and they tacked back and forth in the strong winds from the C buoy to the line with Nick finishing sixth by two seconds.
After PY adjustment, the finishing positions were Martin first, Maddie second, Clive third, Duncan fourth, Jerome fifth, Nick sixth, James seventh and Gary eighth.
The wind was strong and gusty as they started the second race and the sailors battled the winds up to the B buoy. James rounded it first with Gary second and Martin third. James had to serve another penalty when he collided with the D buoy and Gary took the lead. At the end of the lap, Gary led ahead of Martin second and Duncan third. There was a gap to the rest with James fourth, Jerome fifth, Clive sixth, Maddie seventh and Nick a distant eighth after a dry capsize. When the sailors reached the B buoy for the second lap, Gary and Martin got around the buoys with no issues, but the gaps in the middle of the pack closed up as the wind dropped and shifted and made it difficult for the sailors to plot a consistent route around the buoys. Duncan, Jerome, James, Clive and Maddie all ended up together at the buoys with Clive and Maddie managing to steer the best course and sailing up to the A buoy. At the end of the lap, Gary had a huge lead of over two minutes to Martin with Maddie third, Clive fourth and Jerome, James and Duncan some way behind. Maddie made excellent ground and caught and passed Martin on the next lap to take second, even closing some of the gap to Gary. Clive was sailing a lonely fourth with Jerome fifth, Duncan and James battling for sixth. On the fourth lap, Gary extended his lead over Maddie and James passed Duncan and closed the gap to Jerome. The positions remained static for the rest of the race and Gary won the race by almost four minutes, Maddie sailing extremely well in the strong winds in second place, Martin third, Clive fourth. Behind, James caught and passed Jerome on the final lap but lost the place when he got stuck in a tree whilst tacking back to the finish line. Duncan finished seventh and Nick eighth.
After PY adjustment the finishing positions were unchanged.
After four races, Jerome leads the Winter Series ahead of James with Martin third. In the Personal Handicap, Maddie leads ahead of Gary, Martin and Duncan.