A fleet of 29 yachts gathered on Saturday 27th August for the penultimate offshore points race of the RORC 2005 season. Starting at the RYS start line the race was a 110  mile course via the Needles to Ouistreham.

A fleet of 29 yachts enjoyed a mass start at 08:00 under an overcast sky and a light south west breeze of 8 – 10kts. Cutting Edge, Robert Lutener / Martin Elwood’s Farr 45 and Maverick 2, Dominic Chappell’s IMX 40 got the best of the starts. The smaller boats struggled to keep steerage way in the light airs and took many hours to escape the Solent.

The light conditions at the start prevailed throughout the race, with patches of calm in the channel overnight it became a game of avoiding the holes and working hard to maintain boatspeed.

Fidessa-Fastwave, Chris Brown / Peter Harding’s DK 46 took line honours, crossing the finish at 04:09 on Sunday morning.  As they ‘Locked – in’ the visibility began to reduce dramatically, for a time down to less than 200 metres.  The fog finally cleared and a gentle breeze from the south filled in. Second to finish at 0822 was the Class 1 boat Maverick 2 Dominic Chappell’s IMX 40, followed closely by David Aisher’s Judel/Vrolijk 44 Yeoman of Hamble.

Having fought their way across the Channel using every zephyr available, the chasing yachts found themselves once again becalmed and had to wait until the sea breeze kicked in at around 10:00 before the final charge (everything is relative!) to the line could begin.

At 11:15 Stroke Assoc / Eclipse VII, Douglas & Clare Hassell’s Humphreys 12m crossed the finish followed by El Syd, Ian McKinney’s Sydney 41 at 12:16.

First of the Class 2 yachts home, was Night & Day, Pascal Loison’s J 105 at 12:35, far enough ahead of Slingshot, Shaun Murphy’s J 105 to take the Griffon Trophy for IRC 2.  Slingshot did enough however, to fend off the competition in the 2 Handed Division.

Iromiguy, Jean-Yves Chateau’s Nicholson 33 followed on from his recent success in the Rolex Fastnet Race to lead class 3 home and lift the Commodore Trophy.

The RORC would like to extend its thanks to the Société Régates Caen-Ouistreham and in particular the President Philippe Bossé and Patrick Maurice Blanc. The club provided St Laurent a Grand Banks 36 as the Committee Boat for the finish and laid on an excellent buffet in the club after the prizegiving.