Royal Thames Carmela Cup — 28 February '09

28 February –01 March

the National Championship of Two-Boat Team Racing in Keelboats (incorporating the Royal Thames Universities Challenge)

Royal Thames Defend The Carmela Cup

The Carmela Cup moved from its traditional venue in the London docks to Queen Mary Sailing club, and into new boats for the event, the RYA's J80s.

Held over the weekend of the 28^th Feb and 1^st March the event is the national championship for keel boat 2 boat team racing. The event is always keenly fought and attracts the countries top team racers and keel boat sailors. This year was no exception with 5 top quality teams battling it out.

Saturday proved to be a tricky day for all with light winds testing the race committee who despite this managed to run a round robin, with every team racing each other once. It was the defending Thames team, with last years winning helms Andy Cornah and John Pinner who emerged on top with 4 wins out of 4. They were closely followed by Society, whose boats were driven by Dave Royse and Rob Style.

Sunday presented the sailors with a familiar sight- not a lot of wind but sailing eventually got underway and led to a cracking days racing. The West Kirby Sailing club team really stepped up to the plate winning all their races in the second round robin. Really close racing between the Thames, Society and the Farr 45 class team with many races coming right down to the finish line and beyond, meant there was very little to chose between the top 4 teams with Society coming out on top with 6 wins, Thames and West Kirby on 5 with Farr 45 on 4 wins.

With time running out it was decided to run a sudden death play off between the tied West Kirby and Thames teams to see who would race society in the final.

With the breeze picking up to the best conditions all weekend, the Thames got the better of the start, emerging with a 1,2 combination at the first mark. However West Kirby managed to break this down on the run and again it was all down to the final beat. The pairs split left and right and came into the finish at the same time, it was still too close to call until one of the West Kirby boats was given a 720 for failing to keep clear as a windward boat, and the Thames clinched a hard fought victory and a place in the final.

The Final was also to be just one race so the pressure was on to see who would claim the title- At the start one boat from each team was over early and Society managed to secure a 2,3 winning combination on the first beat as in 2 boat team racing the team with the boat in 4^th loses. Following a very close run there was a big incident at the bottom mark which resulted in a Society boat pushing a Thames boat the wrong side of the mark, thought they were found to be in the wrong and the resulting penalty gave the Thames a 1,3 which with some quick sailing and hard covering up the last beat they managed to take the race and the title with a 1,2 finishing combination. This was a very close race to round off a very hard fought competition with Queen Mary reservoir proving to be a great new venue.

Many Thanks to all of the Thames members who put so much time and effort into running such a good event in challenging conditions.

Results:

1^st ROYAL THAMES: Andy Cornah, Ian Dobson, Rich Pull, Tom Montgomery, John Pinner, Ed Hill, Ben Clothier, Mary Rook

2^nd SOCIETY

3^rd WEST KIRBY SC

4^th  FARR 45

5^th RPNYC

After five years in the Royal Victoria Docks on the first weekend of the London International Boat Show, the Royal Thames Carmela Cup moves to a new date, a new venue and a new fleet. The new date is the last weekend in February: Saturday 28th February and Sunday 1st March. The new venue is Queen Mary Reservoir. The new fleet is the RYA J-80 fleet.

The entry fee is £320.

Go here for the Notice of Race and Application for Entry Form.

Applications for entry close on 4th January 2009, after which selection of the 8 teams to be invited will be made.