Good luck to Chris Boshier in the Contender Europeans which start next week in Tuscany, you can follow his progress by clicking on the following link.

http://www.contender.it/euro2008/

14 Sandhoppers joined in with the Hobday Trophy race on Sunday, the weather was great including the force 6 which always makes for some interesting sailing, Sandstar took top spot in our group followed by Sandstorm and Satisfaction, the surprise of the day was watching Apollo limp slowly around the course with a hungover crew that appeared to be fishing using the barnacles on their keel as bait, this helped add to the banter on the balcony whilst celebrating the clubs 60th anniversary.

The Sandhoppers will make their way to Burnham this bank holiday Monday in preparation for the Nationals the following weekend.

Any last minute entries can download all the details on the link below

Download the NOR & Entry Form here

Due to the Air show exclusion zone we will have to swap the Shoreline Trophy with the Petal plate.

The programme alterations now read

Petal plate 25th May 14.30 start

Shoreline trophy 8^th June 15.00 start.

To celebrate 60 glorious years of sailing at Thorpe Bay, the Commodore would like to extend an invitation to all members to join him for a glass of champagne and a few nibbles, on Sunday 18th May, at approximately 1 o’clock, in the main bar – immediately after the Hobday Anniversary Race. It’s not often you get a free drink from the Commodore, so please come along and join him and make the most of this rare opportunity!

If you are visiting the TBYC website for details on the Laser Pico Nationals please click on the “Nationals” tab on the left had side of the screen for further details, including Sailing Instructions and Entry Forms. Also see the how you could win a new Pico.

Two people required to swap our Race Officer AND Assistant Race Officer duties on Saturday 23rd August as we shall be away at our nationals.

Kevin & Lesley Iles

The Sandhoppers held their first long distance race of the year (5 races left to go) on Sunday, 8 boats left the moorings at 7.30 with the start at 8.00, the weather was stunning with a clear blue sky and a 13mph north easterly breeze, Sand Storm (current national champions Chris Clarke and Nick Barnes ) were first around the mid Shoebury buoy clocking 8 knots on the gps, with sand star (Hopper/Thompson) close on their heels, Squiffy, Sand Spirit, Spider, On The Hop, Windrush and Pearl all fought for the other positions, the black tail spit was missed by Sandstorm and the national champions had to come back on themselves to round the mark, the rest of the fleet didn’t laugh to much, three and a half hours of tactical windward and tidal sailing saw Sand Star finish first, at the Maplin Edge, Squiffy second , On The Hop third, Sand Storm (current champions) fourth, Pearl fifth, Sandspirit sixth, Spider seventh and Windrush eighth (Windrush went to the rescue of a fishing boat in distress hence the position). The second part of the race was a long spinnaker leg home Sand Star again took first place, Sand Storm second , On The Hop third, Squiffy fourth, Pearl fifth, Sand Spirit sixth, Windrush seventh and Spider eighth .
However, due to the competitiveness of the fleet we had the video running during the day from our fabulous support crew on Sea Safe 3, Nik Bennindyke, Dan Henderson and Bruce Spratt, (thanks boys for giving up your day ensuring our safety) ,
After collating all the days information and video , unfortunately our national champions forgot to sign on and off for the first leg and were ocs at the start of the second race, never mind messers Barns and Clarke better a lesson learnt now rather than at the national in a few weeks time, so with them out of the chocolates the rest of us moved up a place.
The day was a great success and I hope we will have even more entrants for the next one, if anyone would like to see the video of the day we will be showing it in the club on Thursday evening, watching Chris and Nick over the line by a country mile is very funny to see.

What a great way to end a working day

Author: Paul Spratt

Can anyone help please?

I need to swap my guard boat duty on SS3 on Monday May 26th as we are taking the Sandhopper’s round to Burnham for the ‘Nationals’.

This involves both myself and Tony Byrne.

Many thanks to Steve Hopper who tuned 5 Sandhoppers on Saturday morning, the tuning has made a noticable difference to boat speed, also thanks to both Steve and Peter Thompson for helping to lift out ‘Prey’ very early saturday morning, I would also like to welcome Dick White to the Sandhopper class who has just purchased a boat.