All,

The garfham open will be PRE ENTRY only this year; please enter by Thursday 22nd October. Club will accept fax entries to 01480 812206 with followup by phone to pay on switch CC. You can also enter via email as long as you sign it to admin@grafham.org

As usual we will be running 2 courses one for fast and one for slow; again we will have a single handed start on the fast course.

Please note on the fast course you MAY be required to add an additional number to your mainsail to make it unique, these will be supplied. If you value your number, enter early; numbers will be allocated on a first-come first-served basis.

First race warning signal not before 11:57 Saturday. Usual meal will be available and sailing video's will be shown on the big screen in the evening (when is the next rugby world cup???).

NOR is here



All those who do enter are welcome to come and use the lake on Friday FOC (there will be rescue cover).

Camping and motorhome slots need to be pre-booked as we are strictly limited my our landlords as to how many we are allowed.

Edit: WE need to decide if we want to sail in the Single handed chapionship (start one probably) or as part of the fast handicap fleet (start 3 with the hurricane 59's and T's). last year we sailed in the single handed champs, the club CURRENTLY assume we will do this again.

We are certain of seperate prizes if we get 8+ boats; we will allocate "fleet" prizes in this manner and then the fleets with largest numbers. I think we had 9 last year?

I will be holding some F16 beer vouchers (OK, I'm in for the first round!!).

I am (Currently) planning to be there all day Friday (sailing) and stay the whole weekend.

Required pre-entry with required pre-pay is a sure way to loose entries. Being out of pocket of the entry fee if I don't show up because of weather forecast, broken car, lunar flare or angry wife is not a good prospect.

When did the date changed? The F16 calendar still list it for the 17-18...

Pre-entry was a turn off, this change of date is a complete disaster, I don't think I will be able to attend on that week-end.

I've been twice in the past and on both occasions didn't enjoy the racing, with this in mind I wont be going this year either.
In my opinion Grafham SC don't give much for the competitors enjoyment or safety all they want is your money!

Mark,

That is NOT true.

You had a bad experience last year. I still believe you lost a protest you should not have.

Things WILL be different this year. Strong words have been said to some, and I believe they understand ther nature of the issues.

Maybe catch up next year.

Simon, I'm slightly with Mark on this one but think that part of the issue is trying to squeeze a quart into a pint pot; there are too many boats of varying speeds, abilities and sailing angles in too small a space, especially on the Sunday when the club racing takes place. I did the GP last December where there was much more space and came away with a much more positive attitude towards the club - with the exception of only one member of bar staff on duty serving all the faces they recognised ahead of some stranger from the country......

We can all grumble about too many boats, not eough barmen, very ordinary food or what ever takes your fancy, but if you go to a very big event on a not very big reservoir then over crowding is going to happen.

To some extent this overcrowding brings competitiveness and near miss's that can be pretty exciting though.

I probably won't be up this year but haven't fully made my mind up.

Simon
These are my feelings so as far as I'm concerned they are true.

I was planning to do this, as I've enjoyed the last couple of times I've been. Two things put me off. Firstly, having to make a call between sailing 2-up in a tiny fleet, or 1-up in a decent fleet. If there are only 3 boats on the handicap start, can they not just go with the single handers? You can still score them separately.

Secondly, pre-entering. What is the club trying to achieve with pre-entry? Other clubs do a non-committal on-line registration, which should give a decent rough idea of numbers. I certainly won't be pre-entering before the Thursday, and even then it reduces the chances of me turning up.

Paul

OK. You have a PM.

We have a limit of boats for an "adult" open meeting; I think it is 200.

This limit IS imposed by our landlords Anglain Water.

Some time ago, we (GWSC) got into trouble when we went over this and got found out.

I also belieeve that the trouble in Perry last year made the club decide on Pre-entry; not sure why this is important.

Bottom line is the open is pre-entry; I did not want it to be; GWSC will have to live with people not entering until the Thursday; I'll be there whatever.

Thing is at the GP, there is an even greater spread of speeds!

As for some of the on the water issues, we are going to change the course a little which we HOPE will help!

We have the same PRO as last year and we are still discussing the finer points (2 hours of it tonight); it will still be W/L, but there may be some small differences!

I hope one of the thing you discussed was the position of the start/finish line. Last year the start/finish was an obstruction and too close to the gate IMHO. All the boats were forced to converge on each other to go around the pins.

Having the slow course and the fast course intersect lead to interesting moments as well.

Don't get me wrong, I had fun last year, this was an epic event. But it was sooo crowded!

Has your club thought about splitting this event in two? Frankly there is enough boats in each fleet to sustain two events. A fast handicap one week-end, a slow handicap the week-end after? It will make for less people on the small pond at once, more flexibility for course layout (two parallel W/L course for example, send the one design on the left and the handicap on the right with a shared start finish zone) and only one race management team instead of two at once. Just a thought.

We have discussed splitting the event, but as the open calendar is full (we are allowed 13 a year) we would have to have fleets on alternate years. not an option IMO

We may have come up with a cunning plan for this year; attempting to encourage people to the OUTSIDE of the course downwind

'Occasionally' breaking the 200+ adults on the water rule and given you probably do host 13 Opens per year at the same time as Club racing. I think you are giving yourself enough rope to hang yourself with in connection to my comment about enjoyment, safety and a money grabbing Club Committee