Aldeburgh Dragon Open Meeting, 27th to 29th June 2025 and conclusion of 2025 East Coast Windward Leeward series.
The Aldeburgh Dragon Meeting was blessed for two days with fantastic conditions. A fleet of seven boats turned out for the three-day event including two visitors from Medway and Burnham. Plenty of wind from the right direction and warm. The Gods, however, decided enough was enough and blocked the sea breeze on Sunday with a thick layer of cloud well into the afternoon so that coffee and gossip were the order of the day.
Basilisk, sailed by Patrick Gifford, Martin Spall, and Nick Hayles dominated, winning all six races. Friday started with one in the Home Reach and then moved to the reach below Blackstakes as the wind swung under thermal influence. She exploited canny use of the tidal eddies and excellent windward speed. She was only handicapped by problems with spinnaker hoisting and recovery due to the helmsman’s incompetent rigging. Saturday produced a very shifty and gusty south-westerly with beats towards the Blackstakes point. Again, Basilisk simply seemed to have an edge in speed, aided by excellent crewing and good understanding of the stretch of water.
Behind Basilisk, there was a real tussle for the next four places with many places changing. Ultimately, Hands Off, sailed by Andy Moss, finished second with a very consistent display, counting one second place and a string of thirds. Rick Gillingham in Navaho, Tim Hannon in Harkaway and Edwin Hannant in Gandalf were less consistent, though both Rick and Tim finished second twice and Edwin once. Harkaway suffered from a broken spinnaker halyard, which meant she couldn’t compete in the first two races on Saturday (counting two 8’s) and only a very speedy relaunch got her to the last one to score a very close second, less than a metre in front of Hands Off. Nooka and Monica continue to show significant speed as they learn the vagaries of the Alde, both found the mud, most dramatically Monica. The full results are available on the AYC website.
Aldeburgh showed again that a slightly improbable venue can provide really good close racing. We have been blessed for this event each year so far with wind directions that provide good and fair windward-leeward courses. Long may it continue. The Aldeburgh Dragon fleet is very much alive, supported at all levels, and really delighted to welcome Rick and Navaho back on the water after Navaho’s seven-year sojourn in the back field at Demon Yachts. We hope that Orion and Chime (currently the subject of a thorough restoration at Demon Yachts) will join us very soon.
Results
Sailed: 6, Discards: 1, To count: 5, Rating system: PY, Entries: 7, Scoring system: Appendix A
| RANK | FLEET | BOAT | SAIL NO. | HELM | CREW | R1 | R2 | R3 | R4 | R5 | R6 | TOTAL | NETT |
| 1 | Vintage | Basilisk | 515 | Patrick Gifford | Martin Spall, Nicolas Hayles | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 6 | 5 | 11 |
| 2 | Open | Hands Off | 760 | Andy Moss | Terasa & Tim Wilkes | 2 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 17 | 14 |
| 3 | Open | Navaho | 664 | Rick Gillingham | Angus Gillingham, Will Anderson, Chris Brunsden | 4 | 4 | 2 | 4 | 2 | 5 | 21 | 16 |
| 4 | Classic | Harkaway | 151 | Tim Hannon | John Chalker, Tom Chalker | 3 | 2 | 4 | DNC | DNC | 2 | 27 | 19 |
| 5 | Open | Gandalf | 727 | Edwin Hannant | Howard Patterson, Alisdair MacDonald | 5 | 5 | 5 | 2 | 4 | 4 | 25 | 20 |
| 6 | Open | Nooka | 797 | Andrew Barlow | Steve Dewberry, Niel Campbell, Luke Samuel | Ret | 6 | Ret | 5 | 5 | 6 | 38 | 30 |
| 7 | Classic | Monica | 497 | Hugh Rich | Henry Brewis, John Lepper | Ret | DNC | DNC | 6 | 6 | 7 | 43 | 35 |
East Coast Windward Leeward Series 2025
The Aldeburgh Open Meeting was also the final event in the new East Coast Windward-Leeward series. This spans the East Coast Championship at Burnham, Medway Week and Aldeburgh.
Three of the UK’s six regional Dragon fleets have competed in the inaugural Dragon East Coast Windward Leeward Series. The Series was run in conjunction with Dragon events at the Royal Corinthian Yacht Club at Burnham on Crouch, Medway Yacht Club and Aldeburgh Yacht Club. Sailors from each of the three East Coast clubs were represented. A total of 15 races were sailed across three events with competitors awarded points from their 8 best results. A limit was placed on the number of scoring races that could be counted from any one event to encourage boats to sail at each of the competitions comprising the series.
Congratulations go to the overall series winner Edwin Hannant sailing Gandalf. Second place went to Andy Moss sailing Hands Off. Third Place was secured by Howard Patterson sailing Taniwha with fourth place going to Patrick Gifford sailing Basilisk.
Dragon sailors from each participating club are looking forward to participating in this exciting regional event in 2026.
Patrick Gifford, Andy Moss and Tim Hannon
Next event: visit the BDA Dragon Racing Calendar
Photo credit: Fleur Hayles, Shaun Seer
