Herewith a report on the week’s racing from Peter Haldane. Many thanks Peter.

 

Herewith updated results post Mersea Week. Race Report to follow soon.

Class 4 (Classics) – Race 1 – Sunday 9th July 2017

Last update: Tue Jul 18 19:40

Sail	Name	T.C.C.		Finished	Elapsed	Corrected	Pos
STAR90	SCORPIO	0.775		15:40:16	02:15:16	01:44:50	1
52	ESTRELLA	0.775	%	15:44:53	02:21:17	01:49:30	2
NW6	VENYA	0.836		15:42:47	02:17:47	01:55:11	3
1750	DAMIAN B	0.820		15:55:40	02:30:40	02:03:33	4
1180Y	ALONA	0.816		16:10:58	02:45:58	02:15:26	5
543	SNIPPET	0.776		16:25:16	03:00:16	02:19:53	6
1004	NYACHILWA	0.821					RET

 

Class 4 (Classics) – Race 2 – Monday 10th July 2017Race sponsor: EFG

Last update: Tue Jul 18 19:41

Sail	Name	T.C.C.		Finished	Elapsed	Corrected	Pos
STAR90	SCORPIO	0.775		17:37:38	09:32:38	07:23:47	1
1750	DAMIAN B	0.820		17:13:48	09:08:48	07:30:01	2
543	SNIPPET	0.776					RET
1004	NYACHILWA	0.821					RET
1180Y	ALONA	0.816					RET
52	ESTRELLA	0.775	%				RET

Class 4 (Classics) – Race 3 – Tuesday 11th July 2017

Last update: Tue Jul 18 19:42

Sail	Name	T.C.C.		Finished	Elapsed	Corrected	Pos
1750	DAMIAN B	0.820		12:47:40	01:37:40	01:20:05	1
STAR90	SCORPIO	0.775		13:00:10	01:50:10	01:25:23	2
NW6	VENYA	0.836		13:03:03	01:53:03	01:34:31	3
52	ESTRELLA	0.775	%	13:12:52	02:04:06	01:36:11	4
1180Y	ALONA	0.816		13:11:15	02:01:15	01:38:56	5
543	SNIPPET	0.776		13:30:00	02:20:00	01:48:38	6
1004	NYACHILWA	0.821					DNC

 

Class 4 (Classics) – Race 4 – Tuesday 11th July 2017

Last update: Tue Jul 18 19:42

Sail	Name	T.C.C.		Finished	Elapsed	Corrected	Pos
1750	DAMIAN B	0.820		15:23:10	01:33:10	01:16:24	1
STAR90	SCORPIO	0.775		15:32:07	01:42:07	01:19:08	2
NW6	VENYA	0.836		15:41:00	01:51:00	01:32:48	3
52	ESTRELLA	0.775	%	15:49:04	02:00:15	01:33:12	4
543	SNIPPET	0.776		16:15:44	02:25:44	01:53:05	5
1004	NYACHILWA	0.821					DNC
1180Y	ALONA	0.816					DNC

Class 4 (Classics) – Race 5 – Wednesday 12th July 2017

Last update: Tue Jul 18 19:43

Sail	Name	T.C.C.		Finished	Elapsed	Corrected	Pos
STAR90	SCORPIO	0.775		13:07:35	01:42:35	01:19:30	1
1750	DAMIAN B	0.820		13:04:03	01:39:03	01:21:13	2
52	ESTRELLA	0.775	%	13:16:13	01:52:20	01:27:04	3
NW6	VENYA	0.836		13:09:14	01:44:14	01:27:08	4
1004	NYACHILWA	0.821		13:21:11	01:56:11	01:35:23	5
543	SNIPPET	0.776		13:32:02	02:07:02	01:38:35	6
1180Y	ALONA	0.816		13:27:29	02:02:29	01:39:57	7

Class 4 (Classics) – Race 6 – Thursday 13th July 2017Race sponsor: CLASSIC BOAT

Last update: Tue Jul 18 19:44

Sail	Name	T.C.C.		Finished	Elapsed	Corrected	Pos
STAR90	SCORPIO	0.775		16:26:22	06:01:22	04:40:04	1
1750	DAMIAN B	0.820		16:32:44	06:07:44	05:01:32	2
52	ESTRELLA	0.775	%				RET
543	SNIPPET	0.776					RET
1004	NYACHILWA	0.821					RET
1180Y	ALONA	0.816					RET
NW6	VENYA	0.836					RET

 

 

Class 4 (Classics) – Race 7 – Friday 14th July 2017

Last update: Tue Jul 18 19:52

Sail	Name	T.C.C.		Finished	Elapsed	Corrected	Pos
STAR90	SCORPIO	0.775		14:09:52	03:14:52	02:31:01	1
1750	DAMIAN B	0.820	%	13:55:51	03:04:28	02:31:16	2
52	ESTRELLA	0.775	%	14:11:25	03:18:23	02:33:45	3
NW6	VENYA	0.836		14:07:12	03:12:12	02:40:41	4
1180Y	ALONA	0.816		14:33:06	03:38:06	02:57:58	5
543	SNIPPET	0.776		14:55:57	04:00:57	03:06:59	6
1004	NYACHILWA	0.821		14:55:16	04:00:16	03:17:16

 

 

I recently met a neighbour, Richard Hare, at a friend’s party and as the friend in question happened to be one of my crew, the conversation inevitably turned to Stellas. Richard reminded me of a piece he wrote for Classic Boat six years ago and kindly emailed me a copy of the article for publication on the website.

 

There are many overused superlatives in sailing, “Champagne Sailing” probably being one of them. The 2017 Suffolk Yacht Harbour Classic Regatta, held over the weekend of 17^th & 18^th June, however, certainly provided just that! As Jonathan Dyke, SYH’s MD, classic boat guru and all round good bloke put it, “…if you didn’t enjoy sailing this weekend, you should probably give up sailing…”

Boats gathered at the marina on Friday 16^th and crews socialised in Haven Port YC’s famous Lightship clubhouse that evening. Saturday dawned (a little too early for some…), bright and warm but, as forecast, with very little wind. Breakfast in the Harbour Room was followed by a Skippers’ Briefing. Peter Martin, the ever reliable and knowledgeable race officer at these events and his team set a superb round the cans course out in Dovercourt Bay for the morning’s race 1. Crews then made final preps and motored out to the start line in frankly Mediterranean conditions. The wind gradually built to a rather variable force 1-2 as we reached the line off Beacon Hill Buoy. Nine Stellas, who get their own start followed by slow and fast handicap fleets, jostled for position on the line. Five minutes, four minutes, one minute, gun! Line clear. We’re off! Timoa, Scorpio and Centaur hit the front and that was the way it finished, the course having been sensibly shortened at Pye End buoy. Scorpio And Timoa battled for top spot, Centaur followed on just about staying in touch but clear of the rest of the fleet, individual battles took place further down the order and as the larger handicap boats started to catch up blue skies, blue water and beautiful boats provided a breath-taking spectacle. The East Coast, really!?

After a brief lunch break on the water, Saturday’s race 2 started from the same line at Pye End. A clear start and a good one from Centaur who hit the front only to be reeled in by Timoa and Scorpio with superior boat speed in the steadily increasing breeze. Once again, they set off to settle the line honours between them with Timoa emerging victorious. Centaur and Lodestar battled for third with Lodestar ultimately prevailing. The rest of the fleet stayed more in touch in the strengthening breeze and various individual battles decided the final finishing order.

Back to the marina and a chance to discuss the day over a beer followed by a splendid evening’s entertainment aboard the Lightship.

Sunday dawned hot with literally not a breath of wind. Everyone, I’m sure, feared the worst but Race Officer Peter Martin’s sixth sense kicked in once again and the fleet were sent out to the beacon Hill start line for race 3 to be met by blazing sunshine and a steady force 3! A broadly triangular course split the Stella fleet again with everyone having their own take on how best to deal with the long beat out to the first mark. Timoa and Scorpio rounded ahead of the rest and hoisted spinnakers for a perilously close reach to the second mark. Lodestar rounded third with Centaur and Stardust rounding together. Centaur hoisted earliest and got away with Stardust in hot pursuit. At the final mark, a bear away on to the run home, Scorpio and Timoa were together, Lodestar was in clear water and Centaur and Stardust were still contesting fourth. Scorpio and Timoa virtually match raced to the line with Timoa prevailing to make it three straight wins and Scorpio three second places. Lodestar picked up third and Centaur managed to hold off Stardust to claim fourth.

Final Stella results for the weekend saw Timoa the clear winner and Scorpio in second place. Lodestar narrowly pipped Centaur to third leaving her to claim fourth with Stardust fifth and Lys of Slaughden sixth. Full results can be found at stellaclass.org/racing. The conditions proved favourable for Stellas with no less than six boats featuring in the top twelve for the regatta overall. Timoa was, in fact, only very narrowly beaten into second place by the very beautiful West Solent One Design, Arrow. A truly wonderful weekend, the only sad note being that Mike Spear, SYH’s founder didn’t quite get to see it, having passed away only a few weeks ago. Huge thanks from the Stella fleet to all those involved in organizing the regatta and congratulations on 50 Years of SYH.

 

Peter Dyson

#100 Centaur

General Secretary

Stella Class Association

Summer Update 2017

Welcome to the Summer update 2017. It’s been a busy spring and I’m afraid the spring update became somewhat subsumed by gainful employment and seemingly endless hours spent working on Centaur! Apologies for the omission!

 

The Season So Far…

 All in all, the weather has been pretty kind so far with plenty of opportunities for some cracking sailing.

As I write this the Suffolk Yacht Harbour 2017 Classic Regatta was just a couple of days ago and what a weekend that was! I’d mentioned previously that as Jonathan Dyke, SYH’s MD and driving force behind the regatta has been so supportive of the Stella class, I wanted to see a really good turnout from ourselves. Well you didn’t let me down! Thanks guys. 10 Stellas signed up for the event, the first of the Stella Worlds series, with only L’Etoile, sadly, not making it to the start line. It would have been great to have seen (in the distance…) TW and crew battling it out with Timoa and Scorpio. A full race report will be posted on the website shortly as will the full race results, but suffice it to say it was a truly wonderful weekend. The sailing conditions were perfect (especially for Stellas!), the weather was hot and the three courses set were spot on. Stellas featured heavily in the top half of the results for the regatta overall with Timoa only very narrowly getting pipped to the top spot – not bad at all considering there were 35 boats on the water! The results for the weekend are on the SYH website, syharbour.co.uk and photos should be on there too within the next couple of days.

Talking of photos of the event, did anyone get any? Our normal snappers appear to have been preoccupied with the racing, which is entirely reasonable. Trevor Spero got a few and Helen Montgomery-Smith got one (of Centaur…). Emily Harris and Den Phillips were both covering the event, but as they were both commissioned their work isn’t available for me to publish elsewhere. If you could email anything you have to me that would be great.

The Haven Ports Yacht Club Lightship Series on Wednesday evenings is now underway with two Stellas, Timoa and Centaur taking part. Unfortunately, both boats had to miss the first week’s race due to other commitments – not least preparing for the Levington Classics! The series has been well supported with a mixed fleet of around twenty boats and in the second race Timoa won by a country mile with Centaur coming sixth.

Earlier in the year we talked about a spring social event of some kind. I said I’d organise something if there was sufficient response. Unfortunately, only two members contacted me, so that was a bit of a non-starter. I’m sure there will be other opportunities to get together though during the season and outside the obvious racing events. If you have any ideas, please let me know and I’ll put up a spreadsheet on the website showing what’s going on and who’s up for it. Come on – you know you want to! Whilst on the subject of things social, I was a little disappointed that most of the Stella crews did their own thing on the Saturday evening of the Classics. It would have been nice if we could have all stuck around at The Lightship and had a big Stella table for dinner! One to bear in mind for next year.

 

Stellas at Risk

There seems to have been a bit of a rash of Stellas coming up for sale lately. A couple are “giveaways” and one or two are very pretty boats. The latter are with brokers who tell me that there has been solid interest, so fingers crossed that the sales are completed and we are soon welcoming new members. As for those requiring a lot of love, I will continue to work hard at placing them and would appreciate any ideas you might have as to suitable future custodians.

 

Fighting Fund

 This leads me on to the fighting fund. Many thanks to those who have contributed so far, I really do appreciate it. Unfortunately though, as is often the way with charitable giving, pledges have not turned into pounds in every case. If you can, please do give to the cause – it doesn’t matter how much or how little but it will ensure that when the next Stella Vogel type situation arises we won’t have to dip into reserves and funds will be available for a swift rescue operation.

As I had explained previously, we will not be in the business of buying boats or funding restorations, merely helping where we can with logistics, short term storage, marketing etc. If you would like to contribute, please contact our treasurer, Peter Haldane, peter.walnuts@gmail.com . Our bank details are Stella Class Association, sort code 20-67-90, account number 60020192, payment reference “Fighting Fund”. All contributions will remain anonymous and none will be considered too small (or too big!). Thank you.

 

Stella Vogel

She’s home!

The venerable old girl arrived at the farm on May 10^th, the whole operation having gone without a hitch. She was then lifted (in a very farmer like way… eek!!) onto another trailer, kindly leant by Bruce Johnson, owner of Starfox, and put in the barn along with Timoa and Centaur. Jack and friends will start the lengthy process of restoration in a few months when other commitments permit. Good luck Team Vogel. I’ll keep you posted on progress.

 

 Publicity and Marketing

 As hoped, we’ve had a good little run publicity wise. You may well have notice that I got 300 words and a picture (perhaps not the one I’d have chosen…) in the April/May edition of Classic Sailor and Helen Porter, Andrew Gilmour’s daughter, got a piece on Rollicker in the June edition of Classic Boat.

Dan Houston, Classic Sailor’s editor, has promised me more space in forthcoming issues and Emily Harris’s coverage of the Levington Classics will feature in the next issue of Classic Boat and hopefully include some superb Stella photos.

Going forward, I will be talking to Emily shortly about how she can help the Stella cause. We had a brief meeting at the Classics, she is a real Stella enthusiast and is keen to help.

 

 Website and Communication

 Once again, Christian and I continue to try to make the website as lively and up to date as we can but, as ever, we could really do with more input from yourselves. Anything newsy, of general interest, amusing, technical – whatever, is gratefully received. Keep it coming!

 

 Have a great season – hope the weather stays kind…

 

All the best,

Peter

Centaur #100