Brookvale - Hangovers, curry breath, shifts, protests and a bad decision!

So, Brookvale has been and gone - its the final leg of the double-chine for us, as far as we cans ee we've done enough to win the Enterprise Midland Area Double-Chine series again this year, just... So, James and I converged on little Brookvale SC, pretty much under Spaghetti Junction (6) of the M6 - James had a hangover and I had curry-breath, champioship preperation at its best! After the usual formalities we hit the water, the course being the usual Brookvale course, with the fitful, shifting breeze coming down the lake from the club end. Me an' James enjoyed a nice cuppa tea before racing commenced and discussed the last season and what we were gonna do next season, one of the conclusions was that we have to get better big fleet starts.... then I realised that I'd forgot my sailing watch... not a bloody good start at sorting that out!!

Race 1
So, about 8 boats made there way down to the start line for the first race, the wind was light but not too desperate.

Me and James hung around by the committee boat, as we hadnt got a watch between us - luckily it was the favoured end each race... Once the 1 min gun went, all that could be heard from our boat was me saying "..1 potatoe, 2 potatoe, 3 potatoe......30 potatoe, 40 potatoe..." I was quite accurate with that method and we had an OK start.

The the first race went in typical Brookvale fashion, we were doing OK for a while but lulls, shifts and general randomness of breeze got the better of us, plus we managed to run aground and pic-up a fishermans line - and once the short race (40 odd mins) had settled down we ended up in 3rd place - Martin Davies in 1st and Youngy on his home H2O in second place. We managed to run agroud once (bottom of the centreboard is no longer in good shape!) and strangley during the last lap of the race the fishing line and attached weights/float start to tap-tap-tap on the bottom of the hull, quite bizzare and it sounded like sum bloke was trapped under the boat and waz trying to get our attention... we never did find anyone, only the line and hook etc

Race 2
After some lunch, we went out for the second race, breeze had increased a fair bit and I think, although noone saw it to coroberate it, we may have got on the plane!! So, again not a terrible strart, but this time there was a bit of congestion at the first windward mark... we were lying around 3rd and right infront of us Martin Davies and Ian Friswell ahd a collision at the amrk, basically Martin ran out of space at the mark and went into the side/back of Ian... a few shouts were heard but no protests or 720's... so, not wanting to be loved by anyone in the fleet we decided to lodge a 3rd part protest - we hailed them both asking them to so their turns or protest, they didn't so we di :-) HAPPY DAYS....

So the race, although interesting basically finished with Ian first, me and James in 2nd place and Ian in 3rd.. although the protest may well change those results (we hoped to us 1st and Ian 2nd).

Race 3
So with it all to play for we hoped i.e. we figured Martin would be lobbed out of race 2, we went for it - it was a close race, we led most of the way, with Ian chasing hard for a while and then we were pushed hard by Martin also, but the race finished with us in 1st (Hurray!) and Martin 2nd...

Overall
So, we hurredly got the boat sorted, de-rigged and packed up, had a cup of tea and got the protest form in, by around 4:15pm I was in the protest room infront of the jury explaining my "thing"... simply put, there was an incident at the first mark, Martin davies may or may not have had water on Ian, but Ian couldn't alter course because of a boat on his leward side and there wasn't a gap to fit Martin into, rather than bail out of the mark rounding and avoiding a collision he hit Ian - so nice and simple, Martin did not avoid a collision when he had opportunity to do so.... the other guys went into the preotest individually and put across theit piece - then we all gathered and went through the eveidence - it was agreed that Martin hit Ian, Martin said that in hindsight he could have avoided a collision, Ian said he couldnt give water because the boat outside of him would bear away...

So, Ian was sandwiched and couldnt do anything, Martin could have bailed, but decided to barge through.. easy one to judge..... so after probably over an hour the protest committee still hadn't made a decision, I was in trouble with Claire and the only people left were the 3 in the protest and youngy eventually they delivered their decision:

Bizzare turn of events
So they decided in their infinite wisdom to disqualify Ian for not giving Martin sufficient water - but Ian was sandwiched, he couldn't do anything! so the guy who just piled on through, stayed the winner of the race and hence, VERY dissapointingly the winner of the event, with us in 2nd place and Youngy now in 3rd...

So, jsut to keep the cat running randomly through the pidgeons I have requested a copy of the protest findings, so that I can appeal, 'cus it just aint right....

So, I think the above is fairly accurate, so please feel free to let me know your views on that decision - is it right????? We dont think so - put summat on the chat board or leave a comment or email me...

Right, i'm gonna find the map for where the hell I'm meant to be ahving a meeting tomorrow and shave my head...Gggrrrr..