A sunny Weston wind greeted the 13 Sailors who turned out for the 2021 annual Clevedon Sailing Club Regatta.

In race one during the fast handicap fleet, Benedict Whybrow (Laser Radial), Chris Cooper (Laser) and Stuart Turner (Laser) were the first to reach the Pier mark followed by the rest of the pack who were jockeying for room to round the mark.

The beat out to the Sea mark proved challenging in the tide and those who tacked too soon to lay the mark suffered badly and allowed Cooper, Turner, the RS200 of Mark Elliott and Evie Summerell and the D Zero of Neil Ballard to break away.

Martin Gibson (Laser Radial) recovered well to stay with the leading four boats but it was Turner who took home first place ahead of Gibson, Cooper and Ballard.

In the Slow Handicap, Cadet Rory Stretch in a Topaz Race was the only boat to make it round the challenging course.

In race two, officer Robin Goff set a smaller starboard triangle due to the falling wind.

In the Fast Handicap it was once again Turner who got away early, closely followed by Ballard and Cooper.

Ballard in the faster D Zero passed Turner on the reach to the sea mark and remained unchallenged for the rest of the race to take first ahead of Turner, Cooper and Gibson.

In the Slow, Rory Stretch in the Topaz proved too quick for the Topper of Sam Newall, who sailed well to complete the course.

The third and final race saw the beat down to the Bandstand mark and a lot of place changes, with Ballard again leading the way to the sea mark followed by Turner, Cooper, Elliott and Gibson.

It looked like Ballard had it in the bag but together with Elliott he stopped, thinking they had finished, allowing Turner to move into the lead.

After realising his mistake, Ballard was unable to recover and allowed Gibson to finish above him in second.

But Ballard held on for third place ahead of Cooper and once again in the slow fleet Stretch proved too fast for Sam Newall’s Topper.

Overall Results, Fast Handicap: 1 Stuart Turner (Laser) two points; 2 Martin Gibson (Laser Radial) four points; 3 Neil Ballard (D Zero) five points; 4 Chris Cooper six points.

Slow Handicap: 1 Rory Stretch (Topaz) two points; 2 Sam Newall (Topper) four points.