Race Report

Well what a race it was! 23entries including one from Australia and one from Israel. The weather was great with sun and a mixture of wind strengths but never too strong. Driac attracted a lot of interest both in Barmouth and later and this year she held her own pretty well.We were on a close reach out of Barm

outh from the start, the wind held and as we were not absolutely close hauled there were still a number of boats in sight when we reached Bardsey Sound on Sunday at dawn. Ant was on the headland watching and gave us valuable low-down on the movements of boats out of our sight round the point by radio. This helped us decide how best to tackle the tidal set as we went round.

We made it to Caernarfon bar in a good time but the tide was just turning against us and the wind died so it was out with the oars. The new arrangement of folding outriggers (made by AC Marine) just for'ard of the cockpit was pretty good and we made a knot and a half under oars. Charles had some carefully prepared story about having strained his back but in th

e end was prevailed upon to set up the spare oar to push on near the bow and we slowly overhauled two other boats rowing and two at anchor. By the time we reached the Mussel Bank Buoy where we could start the engine we were using all three oars and making about a yard a minute, but we did it and left four or five boats trapped by the increasing tide and waiting for it to fall off.

Nick and Vernon ran Snowdon in a respectable time, being met by Ant with cold water at Snowdon Ranger on the way up. Vernon had cramp quite badly which slowed things and when they returned to Driac we decided that we would do better to round Anglesey than to go through the straits at a bad time and with increasingly light winds. Several other boats made the same decision and we saw them many times over the next day and night. On Monday morning we celebrated Driac's official 80th birthday by overhauling two other competitors under spinnakers; we were carrying a great pres

s of canvas, with main, genoa, staysail, spare jib flown to windward from a pole and the storm jib and trysail flown as water sails. This was immensely satisfying!

Sails were up and down in various combinations all the way to Whitehaven and we were delighted to learn when we got there that there were five

or six boats behind us. Ant was ready with the bikes lent by Pete Robinson and Stefan and C

harles (the U Boat and the Steam Engine) did the Scafell run; it was not too hot and they did it in just over ten hours, an hour less than last year. It was particularly good that there were seven other teams out at the same time and with the route out and back being the same we saw them all at different times. The atmosphere was very friendly and encouraging.

Back at Whitehaven the crew were repairing various faults with the help of Ant and his car and also

were able to look at and photograph Driac 11 which by chance is on the hard at Whitehaven. She is a sorry sight, having been poorly restored and though smart above the waterline, she is a mess below with soft timber and badly leaking seams. We also had the delightful and unforeseen gift of a fine chocolate 80th birthday cake from the race committee and Marshals. That shows the spirit of the race.

We left Whitehaven with two other boats and there were 6 or 7 of us all heading for the Mull of Galloway together. We rounded it on Wednesday morning and raced the others up to the Mull of Kintyre where the tide turned against us and we were forced to row for two or three hours to slow our backward drift. During the night a yacht motored past, cutting right under our bow; we later discovered it was the Salty Peaknuts who had apparently got tired of the race and decided to motor to Corpach. All this time we were being constantly supplied with delicious and plentiful food by the Professor down below; he even stood watches on occasion! We generally tried to let runners sleep through and this meant some long night watches but it seemed to work all right.

On Thursday morning we had a great race with Fantom and Vagabond as we passed up the sound of Jura and the sound of Luing. At Oban Charles made a sudden personal decision to go west of Lismore, not East like the other boats. Immediately the wind dropped away and we had to row on and off for an hour or so. Once past the lighthouse we got a great wind roaring down the sound of Mull and flew along at 7 or 8 knots for a while but the rival boats crept out into view just ahead of us so the plan ultimately failed.

It was a long run down to the Corran Narrows but we had the last of the wind with us and managed to stay out of the main current until right at the narrows then pushed gently through at half a knot over the ground. There was a good deal of rowing then to reach Corpach and we got in at 1 am. Nick and Stefan ran the Ben in fine style while the others revelled in the company of two lovely wives and large quantities of beer, champagne, wine and whisky. They got back just after we had bedded down , at about 6am; Stefan as usual looking as fresh as a daisy.

We may have missed the official party but we had a good time and met a lot of the other crews during the night. Driac came 17th, beating three boats plus three which were withdrawn or disqualified; a fine achievement for an old lady. A great and richly adventurous week with as fine a group of men as will be in one place together for a long while.