Results

It is very encouraging that this year we succeed in arranging a DS-DM for BB10m especially after the disappointing cancellation last year due to too few participants. In total 18 boats are registered in this years DS-DM, of which 2 are from Germany (GER-3 and GER-69) and 1 from Sweden (SWE-5).

Wednesday July 27

Chairman of Lundeborg Sejlklub gives the welcome address to the BB10m DS-DM 2005

The weather is fantastic, a light wind and nice sun shine. The boats arrive in a continuous manner to the beautiful Lundeborg Harbor and Regatta chairman, Poul Erik Schlosser, has reserved mooring space at a temporary pier between the picturesque old harbor and the new leisure boat harbor. Tents are raised and mobile homes are parked behind the harbor and on top of a cliff with a fantastic view over harbor and the sound. It is nice to see that many of the crews members are accompanied by their families, including children in all ages. This creates a lot of life on the camping site and between the sailors. Several of the boats leaves the harbor again to go out for a last trimming test before it gets serious tomorrow. After a few of the boats are put on land for scrubbing of the bottom, it is time for measuring the sails, something which a professional from Lundeborg Sejlklub does in a tent raised in order to have room for the various meals for the crews. Finally, The chairman of Lundeborg Sejlklub, Kenneth Arndrup, gives the welcome address in front of the sail club building.

Thursday July 28

The weather is really bad. The rain can be heard on the roof of the tent where we eat the breakfast. Luckily the weather gets better when we have made the lunch packages and we make the boats ready for sailing. The wind is light from a south-easterly direction and the current is north-bound. The first race starts on time at 10 am although the starting line is arranged with too much advantage to leeward. Thus, essentially all boats are pushed over the line at starting and a general recall is made. Then a new start is prepared with the 1 minute flag raised. Unfortunately, the wind direction changes so that with the help of the strong current the first mark can be reached without tacking. This gives rise to several movements of the rounding marks during the race. DEN-33 gets a good start, is quickly leading and can hold the lead the whole time to the finishing line. Number two is DEN-8 with the present champions, DEN-67, on third place.

The weather improves at midday and the sun starts to shine. The second race is started but again the starting line is too skew with all boats clustering at leeward mark. However, this time we have a more correct beat up against the wind. DEN-48 has a good start and is leading at the first mark. However, DEN-8 has superior speed in the light wind which is now in the east/northeast direction. DEN-8 takes over the lead and increases all the time the distance to the following competitors (DEN-48, DEN-67 and DEN-33). He finishes in superior stile with DEN-67 second and DEN-33 third. 

Beautiful view of BB10m on down wind course in the second race

After the second race the wind is almost gone and the referee decides to delay the start of the planned third race. After more than one hour of waiting for some wind the referee decides to give up more races this day and the boats head for the waiting beer in the harbor. 

Due to an unclear description of how the marks in the gate shall be rounded in the final leg to the finishing line, DEN-48 lays down a protest against a number of boats which have not respected the gate. However, the protest is not accepted since the procedure is wrong (The boats which DEN-48 was protesting against were not notified and DEN-48 did not raise the protest flag). The protest, however, gives rise to a clarification from the referee's side that the gate does not have to be respected on the last leg.

The experiences during the races are later discussed at the tables in the tent where Lundeborg Sejlklub in a fantastic nice summer evening is hosting a overwhelming barbeque with lots of delicious sausages, spare ribs and entrecote together with salad and different other accessories. Great success!

Friday July 29

The Friday starts with no wind and rain. The referee decides to delay the start before the boats leave the pier. Soon the wind starts to blow from a northwestern direction and several BB10m's leaves the harbor. The delay is cancelled and the starting procedure of the first race this day can begin (after 60 minutes have passed as required). The starting line is this time perfect and all the boats start without early starters. The race becomes a thriller with several wind jumps (e.g. 2 x 180°) in the light wind with thunder. We experienced among other things to sail upwind on the downwind leg and using the spinnaker on the upwind leg. Maybe not the most fair way to find a winner. On one of the legs a strong thunder-shower moves over the boats with thunder and lightning and lots of rain, but the weather quickly clears up with light wind and sun shine. The referee chooses to shorten the legs in order to have us finishing before the wind dies completely. DEN-67 wins the elevator-race with DEN-33 second and DEN-63 third.

The referee then signals delay and after some hours of waiting he chooses to send us to the harbor with the message that we shall be ready for another race before 6pm if the wind starts blowing again. This happens around 2pm with a stable wind from north and we are again on the water to prepare for the second race. It gets more and more windy and a single boat (DEN-63) mounts the jib instead of the Genoa before the start. The 1 minute rule is signaled from the referee boat but two boats (SWE-5 and DEN-16) are anyway over the line in the start. We soon realize that the advantage is not under land where the wind is very light. DEN-63 leads the race some time after the start but cannot keep the lead. The difference in advantage between going under land and going further out means a lot of movements between the boats, but DEN-33 seems to best take advantage of this condition with DEN-8 right after. While the wind moves in an easterly direction it slows down and the referee decides to shorten the race legs and make a finishing line before the third windward leg. DEN-33 wins the race with DEN-8 second and DEN-63 third. The spread among the boats means that two boats (DEN-87 and DEN-19) does not make it to the finishing line before the time limit (30 minutes after the first boat has crossed the finishing line). A protest from DEN-67 and GER-3 against DEN-18 (e.g. a starboard/port episode) means that DEN-18 is being disqualified from this race.

A crew member on the referee boat fishes while we are waiting for wind to come

Saturday July 30

Bad, bad. What a weather: heavy fog and no wind. Soon after starts the rain and the breakfast is eaten in the tent in a depressive mood: we really want to go sailing so that we can have a fifth race and one to subtract (although some of the crews are not so interested in the possibility to have a subtraction!). Delay is signaled in the harbor and everyone walks around for hours while we are looking for signs of wind on the water. But the only thing which we can see are the rings from the rain drops. At noon we begin to eat our lunch packages. Finally, at about 12:30 we observe some movements on the different flags, the delay is cancelled and the referee boat and the assisting boats are leaving the harbor. The same are the BB10m boats doing because everyone knows that the deadline for starting the last race is 2:30 pm. Luckily, it becomes more and more windy but the referee has big problems to lay a race course since the wind direction keeps on moving towards a westerly direction. Finally, we start at about 1:45 pm in a moderate breeze but so windy that a few of the boats has put on the jib. Although the black flag has been signaled and there is a small advantage at the windward end of the line there are no early starters. On the course to the first mark the boats divides in two: some goes under land other stay further out but it quickly appears that the advantage is under land so there are some movement among the boats. After the first mark the boats can put up the beautiful spinnakers and on this leg the wind increases to a heavy wind (about 15 m/s in the puffs so everyone are careful to control the spinnakers. In the top there is a dramatic fight about the placements since very few points divide the boats. Although DEN-67 sails a very nice race in the heavy wind and wins the race in front of DEN-33, it means that all together DEN-33 wins the gold medals with a superior series (1, 3, 2, 1, 2).

Congratulations to the new Danish Champions in BB10m! After 5 races we could put the Gold medals around the neck on the skipper Bjarne Venø Petersen and the crew members Mads Christensen, Søren Molder Hansen and Claus Møller Christensen in DEN-33, Jazz. Silver medals went to DEN-67, Hancock/Kryss, only 1 point after. DEN-8, who was lined up for a victory after the first day becomes Bronze winner.

After the winner - as the tradition requires - was thrown in the water, we go to the regatta dinner with prize distribution (see the pictures). Besides the prizes (thanks to the sponsors: Uni-Safe A/S, Hancock Bryggeriet, North Sails, SportMaster and Børresens Bådebyggeri Aps.) to the ten best boats, the Danish BB10m Club gave a prize (a very nice aluminum boat) for the best maintained BB10m. Michael from DEN-42 explained the reason for selecting SWE-5 for this prize. GER-69 got a prize for the best foreign boat and DEN-41 for the best first-timer. Then the chairman of the Danish BB10m Club gave a very nice half model of the BB10m to Bjerne in DEN-53 for his efforts to have the class rules modernized. Lundeborg Sejlklub represented by the omnipresent regatta chairman, Poul Erik Schlosser, also got a half model as a thank for the excellent work in arranging such a big event and finally Ingrid received a large bunch of flowers for providing all the excellent meals during the regatta. Finally, the chairman could announce that Kaløvig Bådelaug has offered to arrange DS-DM for BB10m in 2006 and we only lack a date for the regatta (members of the Danish BB10m Club are most welcome to give input to useful dates).

SWE-5 sailing with spinnager in 5th and last race, spinnagers on their way to the finishing line and the celebration of the Gold winners, DEN-33

Final RESULTS after 5 races (with 1 subtracted):

Number of participants         :   18 
Points for  DNF, DNS, DSQ, etc. :   19  
Points for DNC: 19

DNC: not participated, DNS: not started, DNF: not completed, RAF: gave up, DSQ: disqualified, RDG: compensation 
ZFG/SCP: 20% points-punishment, OCS: start error, BFD: black flag - disq., DNE, DGM: disq. (no subtraction)