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Twenty two Solos gathered at Annandale Sailing Club, Lochmaben for the Scottish National Championship over the weekend
of 08-09 July 2006. This is the furthest South a Scottish Solo event has taken place and the first time the Championship
had been sailed there.
After a spell of hot, sultry weather the forecast for the weekend was 'blustery showers', and on Saturday blustery was
certainly right. Racing started promptly, thankfully with a rescue boat guiding the fleet round a course of complex
twists and turns. Andy Davis (Bala) was recorded OCS, nobody realising how crucial this was to become! Chris Brown (RYA)
opened his scoresheet with a win followed by Robbie Wilson (Wormit) and Steve Boon (Nantwich). Race 2 continued back to
back in similar gusty & shifty conditions, with Oliver Dumbelton (Nantwich) winning followed by Andy and Robbie.
The fleet came ashore for tea, and then set out for race 3. By this time the weather had become even more erratic,
gusting force 6. There were some casualties, myself included having inadvertently drifted over the dreaded pipe just
before the start! Chris & Robbie were very close at the front, but by the end of the race Andy had taken the lead
followed by Chris & Robbie.
On Sunday the showers came to go with the blustery! Two more races back to back, with honours shared between Andy
& Chris each taking a 1, 2, and with Oliver consolidating with two 3's. This left Chris & Andy tied on 6 points, and
with the same scores excluding discard. This event habitually has an amendment to the scoring rules to include discard
before reverting to the final race result, and on this occasion it crucially affected who became Scottish Champion.
Suddenly Andy's discarded OCS in race 1 became bad news when compared to Chris' 4th place discard. Chris was the
new Scottish Champion and Andy the runner up, a reversal of last year's result.
Overall Results:
1st 4590 Chris Brown (RYA) 6pts
2nd 4600 Andy Davis (Bala SC) 6pts
3rd 4553 Oliver Dumbelton (Nantwich SC) 12pts
4th 4214 Robbie Wilson (Wormit BC) 16pts
5th 4517 Kevan Gibb (Largo Bay SC) 26pts
David Lumbard #4462, East Lothian YC
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