(Hamble, England)- Winter finally came to the Garmin Hamble Winter
Series in time for the final race, to show crews just how lucky they’ve
been throughout the unseasonably warm event. A brisk, cold westerly
wind that fluctuated between 10 and 25 knots gave the assembled sailors a
challenge when it came to choosing sails, not to mention working out
how to make their boat go quickly upwind in a nasty chop. The regular
finishing positions in many classes were turned on their head as boats
came from behind after a windy series’ practice to beat the top-placed
boats.In many classes, the overall series winner has been obvious for some weeks now – and in these classes the real battles were for the remaining podium places. Trying valiantly to close the gap to second place was the J/133 JINGS! sailed by David Ballantyne and crew. JINGS! posted another fourth to secure third overall for the series in IRC 0.
In IRC 1, the see-saw battle amongst the top ten boats continued with a few surprises in the final results. Ivan Trotman's J/122 JOLOU reveled in the tough conditions, posting a 3rd to jump back into fourth overall for the series, a fitting finale for this devoted and successful team. Perhaps the biggest surprise was the rapid ascent of the J/111 JENGA VI sailed by Chaz Ivill, a 2nd on the final day elevated JENGA VI into second place overall!
In
the J/109 class, David Richards’ JUMPING JELLYFISH won the final race,
with overall winner, Richard and Valerie Griffith’s OUTRAJEOUS finishing
sixth. In the final tally, OUTRAJEOUS won with 10 pts, followed by
David and Mary McGough's JUST SO in second with 22 pts and Paul
Griffith's JAGERBOMB in third with 27 pts. Rounding out the top five in
this competitive group was David Jobson's AUDAJIOUS in fourth with 34
pts, winning on a tie-breaker over David McLeman's OFFBEAT. In IRC3, Mike and Jamie Holmes' J/97 JIKA-JIKA simply sailed their fleet off the Solent, winning by counting all 1sts for a total of 8 pts! Five J/97s were racing in IRC 3, following JIKA-JIKA is Nick and Adam Munday's INDULJENCE, 2nd in J/97s and 5th overall and third in the J/97s was Gillian Ross' INJENIOUS. The two J/92s' sure had a fight on their hands with their stablemates. Nevertheless, the J/92s sailed very well, with David Greenhalgh and John Taylor's J-RONIMO sitting in 6th and Andy Howe and Annie Kelly's BLACKJACK in 7th just two points back.
And, as ever it was a match between the J/80 JESTER sailed by Mike Lewis and the Hunter 707 in the Mixed Sportsboat class, with JESTER taking the day’s race, but not enough to take the overall class prize, missing the first four races didn't help their case so Mike's JESTER team had to count two DNC's in their eight counting races! Sailing photo credits- Paul Wyeth. For more Garmin Hamble Winter Series sailing information
