Racing started at Gorleston on Sunday with sunshine and a very shifty offshore wind, particularly in the last race when it swung from SW to nearly NW.

It was the start of the Watling Plate series with three races, the first a windward-leeward course, the second a triangular course and the final race sailed around an Olympic course.

Veronica and Ben Falat read the shifts well winning all three races in their Fireball and winning the final race with a five-minute lead.

In race one, Richard Brown, sailing a Laser, stayed close enough to the main fleet to claim a second on corrected time.

In race two, Martin Browne and Di Slater sailing a RS400 came closest to beating the Falats, finishing only a few seconds behind the Fireball on corrected. In the final race, Phil Highfield and Tamsin Butcher claimed second place sailing their RS500.

Dinghies were again lacking in numbers on Oulton Broad and with the wind coming from the south west the start was inevitably biased which meant most races were won on the start line and then became a bit processional without much place changing.

Duncan Madin got the best of the starts in the first Fast Handicap race in his RS100 and comfortably beat David Gooch sailing Crisis followed by the leading Laser sailed by Andy Bedwell.

John Lockwood and Helen Taylor are becoming the crew to beat in the Squibs and they had a good lead over Peter Horton with Denise Kerr in third.

It was the same pattern in the Waveney race as Geoff Little and Sue Harper got away followed by George Gower and Phil Large but on the second round these two changed places.

This year the Lasers were sailing their class race as part of the second Fast Handicap race and again Duncan Madin was the clear winner from Andy Bedwell and Nick Crickmore third in his RS Vario.

The start of the Mixed Keel race was a bit chaotic as most of the fleet tried to start at the clubhouse end of the line on starboard and Scott Thomas did not help by trying to make a port tack start at the same place.

John Lockwood wisely tacked off rather than get involved in the scrum and he immediately pulled out a useful lead which he never looked like losing, although a couple of times Phil Large narrowed the gap. Denise Kerr held third throughout.