Steady start at Delta Lloyd OCR

Wednesday 27th May, 2009

Today saw the start of the second Women’s Match Racing event of the ISAF World Sailing Cup series, at the Delta Lloyd Regatta at Medemblik, The Netherlands. Strong winds prevented several classes completing their scheduled races, however the Women’s Match Racing went ahead as planned close to the Regatta Centre, giving spectators a view of this new Olympic discipline.

We were due to sail in only three of the flights scheduled today — as usual there are more teams than boats available — but unfortunately these were spread throughout the day meaning it was a bit on/off with delays between our matches. Tomorrow should be better and let us settle in a bit more, with more races scheduled for Annie, Ally and myself.

However it’s been good to get out there and get the first day out of the way. Despite the conditions and my limited experience in helming the Yngling we got round the course pretty well, and today was definitely more about boat handling than a typical match racing day because of the wind. We’re pleased to have won two out of our three matches today, giving us a solid start, and we’re looking forward to building on this tomorrow.

More soon…

Lucy

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Off to Holland

Sunday 24th May, 2009

After the decision was made to replace the Yngling class with Match Racing last year, I have to admit I didn’t think I’d be getting in a Yngling again too soon…How wrong I was!

The first event the Elliott 6s are due to arrive for is Kiel next month and therefore the decision was made to run the Delta Lloyd Regatta in Holland next week in Ynglings. For the last two weeks we have therefore been training in Ynglings in Poole. Although Annie has remained in the middle trimming, with me moving from bow to helm since 2007 and Ally never having set foot in a Yngling before, the training has been very useful not only to get used to sailing these boats but also to continue getting used to match racing with just three crew, not something done much on the current circuit.

The Delta Lloyd Regatta will be the second time the new Olympic discipline match racing will join the other classes in an ISAF World Sailing Cup event. This will be my fourth visit to Medemblik having been once in a Mirror, once in a 470 and last time in the Yngling. We are expecting a good entry this year and Annie, Ally and I are looking forward to racing together again. We’ll keep you posted with how it goes!

Enjoy the sun!

Lucy

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Success at RYA qualifier 3

Tuesday 12th May, 2009

Jody Slater, Hannah Yuill and my younger sister Kate joined Ally and I this past weekend for the third RYA Women’s Match Racing Qualifier at Queen Mary, London.

Six teams attended the event and despite incredibly shifty and light breeze at times, the race committee did a great job to fit in two round robins, best of five semis and best of three finals.

With just one loss in the round robin stages we went through to the semis in first place and therefore being paired against Josie Gibson. With the breeze dying all the time it was heads out of the boat as races were never over until you’d crossed the line but we managed to secure a 3-0 win to go through to the finals. In the other semi-final it was a close battle between Mary Rook and Charlotte Lawrence’s teams. Going to four races, Rook ended up winning the series 3-1 to qualify through to the finals.

Remaining shifty for the finals, the start of each race was important to get the initial advantage and our crew did a great job at calling the shifts to ensure this. Once ahead we had great boat speed and won the finals 2-0 to win our second of two RYA qualifiers this year. This also qualifies us for a place at the ISAF Sailing World Cup event, Kiel week next month.

The final results were
1st Lucy Macgregor, Ally Martin, Jody Slater, Hannah Yuill, Kate Macgregor
2nd Mary Rook
3rd Josie Gibson
4th Charlotte Lawrence
5th Katie Archer
6th Hester Robinson

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Champagne sailing conditions for training in Lymington.

Friday 1st May, 2009

During the last two weeks we’ve had fantastic sailing conditions for our training in Lymington. Sailing against Mary Rook, Annie, Ally and I have had some really productive hours on the water bringing along specialists to help us train in particular areas.

We’ll continue training from Poole over the next few weeks before our next event at the end of May, the Delta Lloyd Regatta in Holland. This will be the second time Match Racing will join in the ISAF World Cup Series but with the Elliott boats not arriving until June we’ll be back in Ynglings for the week, I’ll need to dig out my hikers!

Thanks to Lynx Sport Management for the use of their SB3s over the last two weeks, Jenkins Marine, and everyone for your support.

Lucy

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