DAVID PALMER WINS
DRAGON EDINBURGH CUP
WITH A DAY TO SPARE
For Immediate Release - 6 July 2007
Britain's David Palmer, sailing GBR700 with Mark Pettit
and Kasper Harsberg, won today's fourth race by an
impressive margine at the Dragon Edinburgh Cup in
Weymouth to take the championship with with a 1, 2, 2, 1
score line and a day to spare. With only one more race
scheduled for tomorrow's final day and with the discard
coming into play after that fifth race, David Palmer and
his crew cannot be beaten and are declared the 2007
International Dragon Edinburgh Cup winners and Dragon
British National Champions.
Although David Palmer is a clear
winner the battle on the final is for second and third
places. Len Jones, sailing GBR708 with Jamie Lea and
Philip Catmur, is currently lying second on 19 points
but the two Irish teams - Andrew Craig, sailing IRL192
with Don O'Dowd and Aidan O'Connell; and Neil Hegarty,
sailing IRL176 with Peter Bowring and David Williams,
are hard on his heels and both score 21 points going
into the final day, meaning any of the three could take
second place, while third is an equally open book that
almost anyone in the top ten could close.
The third day of the championship got
off to a slow start as the competitors spent the morning
waiting for the overnight gales to abate. Eventually at
1400 the call came to go afloat with race four scheduled
to start at 1530. When the competitors got down to the
start area the wind was still between 20 and 25 knots
from around 265 degrees and there was a big swell
running with a difficult chop laid over the top of it.
After several hours of inactivity the fleet was
decidedly skittish and it took three attempts and the
invocation of the black flag to get them underway
cleanly.
Sadly the big swells and still strong
winds caught a few people out including Solent Dragon
Fleet Captain Gavia Wilkinson- Cox, whose middle man Tom
Marsh lost his balance momentarily on the first run, got
caught by the top of a wave and found himself out of the
boat. Gavia and her remaining crew member Ben Hancock
immediately turned back but the crew of GBR688
Quicksilver III, which was just behind them, had seen
him go over the side and reached Tom first pulling him
straight aboard as they doused the kite. Within moments
a rescue boat was alongside and Tom was returned to his
own boat. Not surprisingly, at tonight's daily prize
giving the always entertaining Dubarry Daily prize,
which is presented by the Dubarry footwear company and
awarded by a secret committee for "special achievement"
each day, went to Gavia and her crew for their
impressive swimming display.
The incident above and several other
gear failures meant that our press boat spent much of
the day doubling as a safety boat rather than watching
the racing so to talk us through today's action we
turned to Ireland's Andrew Craig, one of the three helms
who will be battling it out for second place tomorrow,
to give us a sailor's eye view.
Andrew Craig - "So today was a really
interesting day. Obviously [we had] a really long wait
as the wind was forecast to comedown. I think the fleet
was quite apprehensive when we got down to the race area
because it was still blowing at between 20 and 25 knots
and then there were two general recalls and he [the PRO]
then, quite rightly, put up the black flag having
adjusted the start line a couple of times.
Andrew Craig - "So today was a really
interesting day. Obviously [we had] a really long wait
as the wind was forecast to comedown. I think the fleet
was quite apprehensive when we got down to the race area
because it was still blowing at between 20 and 25 knots
and then there were two general recalls and he [the PRO]
then, quite rightly, put up the black flag having
adjusted the start line a couple of times.
"I think in all the while we were
going through those three starting procedures the wind
was actually easing. There was a shift at 20 seconds to
go and it went hard left and fell away quite a bit and
we tacked immediately on the shift and headed for the
shore at a very high angle and when everybody came to
the top mark the first five or six boats were quite
close. GBR700 [David Palmer] had got a little bit ahead.
We were approaching the mark on the layline [in second]
and they tacked a very hard cover on us so we tacked to
clear ourselves and then the wind shifted to the right
which meant they came right back up and so our clearing
tack was a complete give away which was where they
probably got away.
They had a nice lead then and there
were a number of shits down the run. Just towards the
end of the run there was a right shift 200m out for the
leeward mark and we saw it and gybed onto it a got
around the correct [right] gate mark and the boats that
chose that mark and headed towards the shore broke the
back of the remaining fleet. GBR700 was first into that
right shift so she doubled her distance and then behind
us there were five or six separated from the pack by the
next top mark.
After that it settled down very much
for the leader and ourselves in second place because the
pattern had become clear that it was the right hand side
of the course that was paying and we just had to
shepherd the fleet for the rest of the race. There was a
very hard tussle between Quentin Strauss and Tim Tavinor
for third place. It was very, very close and in fact Tim
went with a low loose cover instead of tacking right on
him and that let Quentin through.
It was a fantastic day's sailing with
bright sunshine and great wind. As we say in the Dragon
fleet - Champagne conditions!
Top Ten Provisional Results After Three Races
1. GBR700 David Palmer 1, 2, 2, 1 - 6 points
2. GBR708 Len Jones 9, 1, 3, 6 - 19 points
3. IRL192 Andrew Craig 6, 7, 6, 2 - 21 points
4. IRL176 Neil Hegarty 4, 6, 4, 7 - 21 points
5. GBR684 Michael Holmes 3, 11, 12, 5 - 31 points
6. GBR729 Tim Tavinor 5, 8, 15, 4 - 32 points 7. GBR719
Paul Woodman 13, 5, 5, 9 - 32 points
8. GBR656 Ivan Bradbury 14, 4, 1, 15 - 34 points
9. GBR653 Owen Pay 12, 3, 9, 10 - 34 points
10. GBR682 Eric Williams 2, 9, 14, 13 - 38 points
FULL RESULTS
The event is generously supported by
Aberdeen Asset Management, Pettircrow Boat Builders,
Palmers Brewery, Dean and Reddyhoff, ProRainer Clothing,
Bussells Chandlery, Weymouth & Portland Borough Council,
Western Marquees, Marlin RIBs, Dubarry and Bollé.
Daily race reports and results will be posted at
www.edinbur ghcup07.co.uk and for further
information about the regatta please contact David Dunn,
Chairman YCW Championships OA, Tel +44 (0)1305 771147 or
E-mail djdunn@aol.com.
Further information about the event
is available from Fiona Brown, Event Press Officer on
E-mail fiona.brown@fionabrown.com or Tel +44 (0) 7711
718470.
Further information about the British Dragon Association
is available from www.britishdragons.org
Further information about the Yacht Clubs of Weymouth is
available from
www.ycw.org.uk.
The 2008 Edinburgh Cup will be hosted
by the Royal Western Yacht Club in Plymouth and will be
held from 9-12 July 2008. Further information about this
event is available at
www.britishdrago ns.org
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For Further Information Contact
David Dunn
Regatta Chairman
phone: +44 (0)1305 771147
Fiona Brown
Regatta Press Officer
phone: +44 (0)7711 718470
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