Horning Sailing Club’s Regatta Weekend began on Saturday in warm and humid conditions, with light winds signalling the start of the Club’s annual Regatta. Racing this year took place on the River Bure outside the Clubhouse and, as the first warning signal sounded, the wind started to pick up. In a break from tradition, the River Cruisers sailed a downriver race to Ranworth, and were momentarily joined by a Wherry on the start line! The passage race was won by Peter Goshawk sailing Grayling. There were particularly strong turnouts in the Yeoman and Yare & Bure fleets, with the Means family in Painted Jezebel starting with a convincing lead during the first race, and over the weekend they would go on to win several trophies. In other fleets, the racing was much closer, particularly amongst the dinghies, which saw very competitive racing in both the Topper (particularly between Abbey Penny and Anya Gittins) and Allcomers B fleets (Lasers and Splashes). As the wind picked up on the run, the finishes were extremely close, just seconds separating many of the competitors. By the second race the winds had picked up further, which caused a few challenges, particularly amongst the dinghies who were capsizing. The Rebels saw very close racing, with less than 30 seconds separating the whole fleet, and 2nd and 3rd places just one second apart. After the first two Yeomans finished (Tara & Tanskey), there was a large gap before the remainder of the fleet finished.
On Sunday the day started breezy and damp, but by the start of the first race following the traditional Horning Week Church Service on the Island, the sun was trying to make an appearance. The winds were much gustier and several dinghies capsized on the start line of the first race. A squall part-way through the morning also added to the excitement, with boats regularly swapping places and several coming back flying green flags, denoting that they were taking a time penalty. While the race officers were left wondering what had happened out of sight round the corner, in reality it turned out that many had been caused by competitors touching the racing buoys. As the day went on the weather turned more changeable with both sunshine and storm clouds, along with a torrential shower of rain during the start of the afternoon series. Again, finishes were extremely close, with the first three Toppers just moments apart and two photo finishes in the Laser and Yeoman fleets, with the former won by Dominic Copping ahead of Edward Wildman, the latter Toby Fields (Tanskey) ahead of Chris Bolton (Folly), the former despite Tanskey not flying a spinnaker. The last race series saw a far lighter breeze, with the winds shifting and creating further challenges. The most drama came from the Rebel fleet, where one spent part of the race in the reeds before managing to continue, whilst the lead boat, Rebel (Kim West) attempted to sail an additional lap on the finishing stretch, allowing Rebel Maid (Kevin Edwards) to take the win.
Overall, the weekend saw Kevin Saunders in Cockatrice (Reedling) take the Old Malthouse Trophy A, Geoff Stubbs in Tara (Yeoman) the Millenium Cup, Kim West in Rebel winning the Harnser Trophy (Rebel), and the Means family in Painted Jezebel (Yare & Bure) taking both the Butterfly Salver and Suzie Heywood Memorial Trophy. The Old Malthouse Trophy B went to Edward Wildman (Laser) and the Gosling Goblet to Abbey Penny, with the Blackhorse Trophy for River Cruisers going to Peter Goshawk in Grayling.
