THE second open meeting of the F18 travellers trophy was hosted by Parkstone Yacht Club and took place in Poole Bay at the weekend.

A strong 21 boat F18 fleet took to the water, 15 of which had travelled from afar to compete, plus a comparatively small Spitfire contingent for a parallel event.

The racing was due to start on at 13.30 Saturday and the assembled fleet set off from the Parkstone shore in light force three southwesterly winds.

In control of the racing was the home club's Ray Page, veteran of both the F18 world and National championships.

Race one was delayed with a shifting breeze making course setting tricky.

First casualty of the day was Hawk 635 (Nick Brown and Mark Howell) who lost their mast in the increasing breeze even before the race started.

The fleet got away cleanly first time and the majority of the them opted for the port side of the course with the Hobie works team of Gavin Colby and Futzi Camenish (1221) leading the way.

However it was the starboard side that was to pay and the team of Phil and Miranda Cotton (90) rounded the windward mark in the top spot with 1221 recovering well in second.

Then followed a closely fought first down-wind leg with 90 finally being passed by 1221 and the Hobie Tiger (589) of Jonnie Hutchcroft and Parkstone's fleet captain Mark Dickinson.

Racing remained close during lap two and ended with 1221 finishing first and 589 in second. However the team of Jonathan Worthington and Tom Quayle (44) managed to pass 90 to steal third.

Race two again got away cleanly, the fleet opting for the starboard side of the course and this time it was 1221 and 589 that showed the way to the windward mark with the Cottons third.

By now the wind had increased to 15 knots and a couple of teams went for an unplanned swim.

Positions stayed as they were for the next two laps until 589 suffered gear failure and unfortunately lost their mast 500m before the final windward mark.

90 capitalised on this to take second place in the race with 44 coming home in third.

So overnight the top three places were held by Gavin Colby, Phil Cotton and Jonathon Worthington respectively.

That evening crews assembled in the bar area and were well fed and watered by Parkstone YC in anticipation of the strong winds that were forecast for Sunday's racing.

Sunday's forecast for once proved to be entirely accurate and unfortunately racing was cancelled, but a good weekend was enjoyed by all and the Cat fleet say a big thank you to Ray Page and his team for the high standard of race management honed from holding local, national and world championships at PYC.

Sailors also thanked the Parkstone club, in particular Phil Cotton for the loan of the committee boat and all of the volunteers who gave up their precious free time.

In the parallel Spitfire event Stuart Gummer ran away with a pair of aces to count and racing tight behind.

The Spitfire is a 16 foot spinnaker race Cat designed by ex-Olympic gold medalists Yves Loday (Fra) and Reg White (GBR) and is very popular with mixed teams as the sheet loadings are much less than F18.

Results - F18: 1 (2 points) Gavin Colby and Futzi Camenisch, St Moritz YC. 2 (6 points 4/2) Phil and Miranda Cotton, Parkstone YC. 3 (6 points 3/3) Jonathon Worthington and Tom Quale, Gorleston YC.

Spitfires: 1 (2 points) Stuart Gummer/Cris Rashley, Brading Haven YC. 2 (5 points 3/2) Chris Sproat/Georgina Burke Bognor Regis YC. 3 (5 points 2/3) Grant/Adam Piggott, Weston SC.