By way of a straw pole on their WhatsApp Group the Flying Fifteen fleet signed up to a three-race DBSC programme offered by designated Race Officer for the day, Barry O’Neil.
On arrival at the waterfront, the prospect of three races seemed to be a bit optimistic given the wind conditions and the forecast. XCWeather was only promising 4-6knots from a northerly direction moving eastwards as the afternoon wore on. Overhead, the clouds weren’t doing much to suggest there was breeze either. And yet, the Irish tricolour flying at the end of the East Pier suggested that there was something in the bay.
Over the radio, our Race Officer indicated that he was in mobile mode to accommodate MacLir doing the big boat race but latterly his problem was a wind from a Southeast/SSE direction that wouldn’t settle and later again there were problems when he sought to relay the weather mark. However, the best efforts of the committee boat and the mark-layers allowed a three-race programme to be completed, with a short final race being squeezed in before the afternoon was out.
It would be impossible to give a detailed account of three races from memory, so this piece will instead concentrate on some of the aspects of the day!
The “Performance of the Afternoon” Award has to go to Peter Murphy & Ciara Mulvey (3774, Hera) who won the first and last races of the day. In the first race they were well placed throughout the race rounding the first weather mark of a windward-leeward course of two laps in 3rd place behind Ben Mulligan & Cormac Bradley (4081, Enfant de Marie) and Conor O’Leary & Margaret Casey (4028, Ffuzzy). These positions stayed intact for the downwind leg, but on the second beat, first Fuzzy and then Hera got past Enfant de Marie and on the second downwind leg, Hera took the lead and the winning gun on the short hitch to the finish.
The “Most Astute Start of the Day” Award goes to Ian Mathews & Chris Doorly (4093, Mike Wazowski) who executed a perfect port-tacked, pin end start and were never headed thereafter. Mulligan & Bradley were closest to them on starboard tack and took the same inshore route approach to the beat. As with the first race, these two were never headed, but behind them the chasing pack was having a good competition. In the end Niall Meagher & Nicki Matthews (3938, Ffantastic Mr Fox) won through to 3rd place with Murphy & Mulvey coming home fourth. On this basis, three boats were tied on five points each (if it had been a day regatta) – Murphy & Mulvey (1,4), Mathews & Doorly (4, 1) and Mulligan & Bradley (3,2). While one boat had departed after Race 1, a number of others departed after Race 2, leaving a slightly depleted fleet for the third race, a single lap race to the inner weather mark (used previously by Squibs and Mermaids), with the promise of an upwind finish.
The “Symmetry of the day” Award goes to the aforementioned Peter Murphy and Tom Murphy, crewed by Carel (4057, Fflagella) who finished first and second in this race. Mathews & Doorly had departed the scene after their first place so the day’s overall honours should have been a call between Murphy P and Mulligan. However, the least effective start of the day in this race gave Mulligan some work to do and the fading breeze didn’t help his cause either. Murphy & Mulvey led a charge into the weather mark from the left-hand side of the course with Mulligan working the right-hand side in isolation. That basically sealed the outcome of the theoretical “winners of the day” chase.
If it were a “day regatta”, the results might read as follows, all races to count;
1. Peter Murphy & Ciara Mulvey – 1, 4, 1 = 6pts
2. Ben Mulligan & Cormac Bradley – 3, 2, 5 = 10pts
3. Niall Meagher & Nicki Matthews – 6, 3, 4 = 13pts
4. Ian Mathews & Chris Doorly – 4, 1, DNC = 15pts
5. Tom Murphy & Carel – 9, 11, 2 = 20pts.
In overall terms, DBSC has the series recorded as follows,
1. David Gorman & Michael Huang, 4099, 14pts
2. Ben Mulligan & Cormac Bradley, 4081, 23pts
3. Neil Colin & Margaret Casey, 4028, 24pts.
