Day one at this year’s British Classic Week brought wet and windy racing for the fleet of classic and modern classic yachts from the UK, Europe, and as far afield as Australia. Replacing the previous ‘NAB Tower’ Race, the new Forts Race sponsored by Spirit Yachts saw the fleet head east in wind against tide conditions.
Regatta Chairman Giovanni Belgrano commented, “It was epic out there! An awesome day’s racing in good wind and a great course set by race management.”
First day regatta excitement and a following tide saw too many yachts over the line and a general recall for the fleet start on the Royal Yacht Squadron (RYS) line. The second start went smoothly with Classes 1 and 2 setting off from the outer line and Classes 3, 4, and 5 (the Gaffers) from the inner line.
All classes sailed upwind to the east and the first mark, Fastnet Insurance, creating a spectacle for the crowd watching from the shore. Rounding Fastnest Insurance to starboard, Classes 1, 2, and 3 set off on a reach to Wightlink. A port rounding took them upwind to Mother Bank in a building sea state and 15-17 knots of breeze, which steadily moved round to the southeast as predicted by the forecast.
Rounding Mother Bank to port, Classes 1-3 sailed northeast to Darling Associates Architects off the mainland coast. From there, it was a long beat out through the Solent Forts in a choppy sea to Warner.
A gybe around Warner to starboard saw spinnakers hoisted for a spectacular leg back through the Forts against the tide to Kemps Quay. Rounding Kemps Quay to starboard, it was downwind to Browndown to port and on to East Bramble. Gybing around East Bramble to port, Classes 1-3 surfed their way down the waves to finish at the RYS line.
Classes 4 and 5 sailed shorter courses of a similar time length, resulting in all five classes descending on the RYS line in sequence with spinnakers decorating the grey-sky horizon with splashes of colour.
Class 1 was won by Spirit R52 Happy Forever, which joins the regatta from her home port of Mallorca. In Classes 2 and 3 it was the day for Laurent Giles designed sloops, with Cetewayo taking Class 2 and Whooper Class 3. In Class 4, West Solent One Design Enchanted beat Stella Timoa by 0.01 second! Bermudan cutter Eiluun sailed a strong race and convincingly won Class 5.
