James Tulley Yorkshire Topper
Yorkshire young sailors dominate the Topper Class at Eric Twiname Championships 2013
Having endured fickle winds, strong gusts and driving rain at Rutland on Saturday, the concluding day of the championships brought with it far more favourable conditions for the 268 competitors at the event.
Seven junior sailing classes took part at the regatta and it was in the Topper class that the young sailors from the RYA North Zone took the major honours.
In the huge Topper fleet 88 sailors fought hard and North Zone sailor James Tulley from Yorkshire Dales Sailing Club was lying eighth at the halfway stage of the regatta. James had a fantastic Sunday, climbing back up the leaderboard with 7-3-2 to pinch event victory by six points. Second and third places went to sailors from the south, with fourth place going to Rebecca Tenney from Pennine Sailing Club.
Duncan Truswell, RYA Youth Racing Manager, said: “The Championship this year has once again been an enormous success. I have been extremely impressed by the standard of sailing displayed across the RYA Junior classes this year, the sailors have obviously worked hard with their coaches over the winter as part of the RYA Zone and Home Country Squad programmes and its really pleasing to see how much progress has been made and how capable the sailors are. Once again Rutland Sailing Club fielded a massive team of volunteers and have made us all fantastically welcome from word go. I would like to express my gratitude on behalf of the RYA, the Trust and all the sailors who have benefitted. My thanks as well to the Eric Twiname Trust for supporting the regatta for the 27th consecutive year.”
Thanks to the long-standing and on-going support of the Eric Twiname Trust, the event is free to enter with all of the costs associated with the running of the regatta met by the RYA and the Trust. For the full set of results from each class and for more information on the RYA Eric Twiname Championships please visit the event website at www.ryaracingevents.org.uk