The day started with bright sunshine and a good breeze, but cold, for the first day of Snowflake's Sunday race programme.
There were six Yeoman for their Open, some being seasoned sailors at Snowflake, while for others it was their first season. There were six dinghies of various types, Lasers, a Topper, a Splash and a Fireball for their Open.
The first start was for the Yeomans. Positions were static until the final lap. Yeoman 103, Kittiwake (Q Stewart helming) suddenly came up from fourth to take second, pushing Yeoman 144, Avocet (T Palmer) into third. Taking first place honours was vice-commodore Roger Hannant sailing Yeoman 93, Firefly.
The results for the first dinghy race were decided as soon as the race started with the positions not changing throughout. First on the water was the Fireball, Phoenix, helmed by Edward Wildman with Pippa Edwards crewing. Once handicaps had been applied they took third with Flip Foulds sailing Laser 190910 (My Pants 2) first and Toby Pearce in Laser 201707 second. The second dinghy race was again predictable with identical results.
The Yeoman race was somewhat different. The first four Yeomans continually swapped places for each lap and at the finish just over a minute separated them. This time Kittiwake was first, White Spirit (303, helmed by Michael Holmes) second and Firefly third.
Afternoon racing started as a front was passing, which appeared to take most of the wind with it. This time only three Yeoman and three dinghies braved the cold. The Yeoman were close on the first lap then 93 broke away, closely followed by 103 flying their spinnaker. By the third lap Kittiwake and Firefly were playing a game of cat and mouse. On the last stretch Kittiwake overtook Firefly to take first with Firefly 30 seconds behind. Yeoman 173 (Blue Ripple, helmed by Dan Greeves) was third.
The third dinghy race was much more sedate – the Fireball decided to fly their spinnaker for this one. They were quite spread out on the second lap and by the end of the third it looked like Phoenix may have enough space between them and the first Laser to win on handicap, but what wind there was dropped and after handicaps the same positions stood as on the previous two races.
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