Sailing

The sailing activities include dinghy racing, keelboat racing (, Ajax and Royal Harwich One Design), cruiser racing and cruising in company. The annual regatta takes place in August and is open to non-members. Brief details are included in this introduction, with further information in the sailing programme.
Dinghy Racing: Racing takes place on most Sundays from April 1st and on Wednesday evenings in the summer. Classes are Lasers and a Handicap class (which can accommodate most classes). Start times are published in the annual Yearbook and depend on tide times.

In addition there are two junior training weeks and a junior racing week. The final Club series is the Super Series, which is an open series of 15 races held on 5 Sundays over the season selected for the most favourable tide conditions.

Three open meetings are held annually, the National 12 Midwinter in February, the Firefly/Lark/ National 12 in June (report and photos), and the Kestrel/Laser meeting in October.

Keelboat Racing: The Ajax 23 class is very active and runs three race series per year. In addition it holds the class National Championships every other year. The vintage RHOD class boats race in a twelve race series over the summer.

Yacht Racing: The Club is a founder member of the Haven Series which holds a ten race local series and three North Sea passage races for IRC and Haven handicap class yachts (see www.havenseries.org). In addition there is the Three Clubs River Series, for the less serious racer. Finally there is the end of season Bell and Sunk trophy race in October for all types of cruiser.

Cruising in Company: For details of this popular and social programme of cruises please see the appropriate webpage.

Sailing/Handicap Dinghies Class
The Handicap fleet caters for any class of dinghy (Handicaps are based on Portsmouth yardsticks, but set by the Club) and races are held on most Sundays up to Christmas, divided into Spring, Summer and Autumn series. - start time dependant on tides. In the Open Winter Series which runs from October to Christmas starting time is 11 o'clock. Start line is normally Line A, in front of the Clubhouse.
In addition to Sunday racing there is a popular Wednesday evening series on favourable tide days with starts at 7 o'clock.
A separate event, the "Super Series" takes place on five specified days during the summer, with optimum tide conditions. This series has three races per day, with committee boat starts. This event is open to non members and a good turnout is encouraged.
All dinghy series are free entry to members and attract glassware prizes.
All dates and times are to be found in the current year book.
Any queries please phone me - Mary Stamp. Handicap Class Captain. 01473 327855.