The same familiar faces were there, with a few absentees due to open meetings elsewhere. Those Solos who had blitzed Burwain SC the previous day were still licking their wounds after the physical hammering they had endured and Tim Keighley's Laser was circulating a reservoir somewhere south of Bristol.

Hamish "Iron Man" Gledhill, however, not only won the Laser Open at Delph SC on the Saturday, but also walked away with all three opening Spring Series Laser races.  He was chased in the first race by Owyn Wallace and, for one lap, by Matt Cook before our erstwhile Commodore retired complaining of being bored!  Time to get a Solo? A finishing order of Hamish, Owyn and David Hunter thereafter prevailed throughout the day.

Although reduced in number, the Solo class retained its status as the largest fleet, and also enjoyed the most competitive racing. James Porter and Howard Frear were at it hammer and tongs in the first two races, with James prevailing.  They swapped boats in the final race and Howard won - by a country mile!  Is this the time for Howard to move into FRP, or was James baffled by Howard's "funny" Needlespar rig? Perhaps the latter, as James could only manage third with Mike Wallace a useful second. Other's who featured included class stalwarts Mervyn Griffiths, Paul Brunner and Roger Perry.  It was Roger's first sail for 6 months, and he muttered negative comments about the weather.  Perhaps next year he will harden up in a few winter series races rather than having all those exotic winter sun holidays.

Sad to report, there were no Swordfish on the water, yet.  Are they tropical fish needing warm water?

There are no results from the Handicap fleet racing as our reporter left before the computer had done its sums.  But Mike Woodhead (Finn), Dave Baxter (Vago) and Stewart Hoare (Solution) circulated in close company during the afternoon. It was good to see Tony Short and Guy Cokill were out in their RS200's.  Tony capsized in the last race when the wind piped up a little, complaining he was too hot; which proves something - he's got great sailing gear!

On to round two next Sunday.  Will you be there to swell the ranks?