Training Re-certified
Our Training Centre has been audited and re certified as a Recognised RYA Training Centre. Thanks to Nick, Simon, Brian and the team for all their work making this happen again.
We have also been certified to offer Dinghy Racing courses to supplement our Adult and Junior beginner and Power Boat courses.
Gresford Sailing Club Fireworks Night is Back
Gresford Sailing Club’s popular community event is back this year:-
Fireworks Night
Friday 5th November,
Gates open 7pm, Fireworks over The Flash start 7:30pm
Entrance £5 per head, Children under 5 Free,
Pay in cash if possible please.
Parking included.
Refreshments’ including Hot dogs, Soup and Cakes
Please do not bring Sparklers; we will be giving glow sticks to all children.
Saturday Family Sailing
Why should the kids have all the fun? As Friday evening juniors came to an end we asked if any of the parents would like to learn to sail. Nine parents and eleven juniors have taken up the challenge on Saturday mornings.
The aim is to build enough skills for more of our members to join and enjoy our Frostbite series of races in November and December. This not a formal RYA Stage 1 training course, but does follow the RYA Method to introduce (or reintroduce) members to sailing and to be able to sail round one of our racing courses either as helm or crew.
For the Juniors who are already at RYA Level 1-2 we are starting to introduce the basics of racing. We will start to introduce the parents to racing through the later sessions, then coach them throughout the Frostbite series.
Three New Dinghy Instructors
Congratulations to David, Lucia and Zoe who have all successfully completed their RYA Dinghy Instructor training courses. David is now a fully registered instructor, Lucia and Zoe just need to update their First Aid certificates and complete the paperwork.
This is a big milestone for the Club as we build a new cohort of Sailing instructors over the next few years. Back in the spring we inducted nine Assistant Instructors. Over the next few years we hope these foundations will provide a sustained team to help us introduce more juniors and adults to our sport and club.
Regatta Weekend 10-12 September 2021
Our Regatta Weekend started on Thursday evening with 6th Wrexham Scouts coming for a taster session. Lack of wind gave us the opportunity to get the Scouts into our Opi dinghies with paddles to learn balance and the basic control of boats. Teamwork saw some of the younger members winning the paddle races then exploring the Island. A theory session with knots and the naming of parts of the boats saw all 13 Scouts gaining their Level 1 Sailing badge
Juniors End of Season Party and Award of Certificates, Friday 10 September. Light winds and 36 children on the water. with nights drawing in this was a relatively short sailing session followed by the award of Certificates and a post sailing pizza party organised by the parents.
Arthur Jones Classic Regatta: Saturday 11 September. Racing for the GP14, Enterprise, Mirror and Solo trophies. Officers of the Day Nick & Simon organised a series of three races with fierce completion in variable and shifting winds. Elin sailing Nick’s Solo for the first time quickly got to grips with a new boat leading the fleet in the second and third races to take the overall trophy. Alan Rogerson excelling with his accustomed wind knowledge and guile to take second overall.
Arthur Jones Classic Reg Gibbs Trophy Results.
Overall winner Elin Jones
Solo 1st Elin Jones 2nd Chris Jones
GP14 1st Alan Rogerson 2nd David Hopkins 3rd Peter Barker
Enterprise 1st Leigh Whitley 2nd John Young
Our Model Boaters put on an impressive display of their beautiful models in the club house, while on the water there was keen racing and more displays by the powered models.
Quiz & Chips and our annual Paper Boat Racing Competition, Saturday 11 September. About 35 members and guests came along for our fun, vaguely nautical themed, quiz night During the First round of the quiz teams competed for chocolate prizes which were then used to hire the younger members as their Paper Boat Racing competitors. The children then competed in pairs in two series of races Ultimate winners were Gareth and Cerys. The evening was rounded off with Fish & Chips, with a free bar and cake to celebrate organiser Chris’s milestone birthday.
Pirate Day with Bart’s Bash: Sunday 12 September.
Chaos and bedlam with a Pirate Theme. Fancy Dress optional.
11:00 Bart’s Bash Race, 20 boats and 24 competitors in this drag race around the Flash nearly beating our previous record of 23 boats and 24 competitors. Very light winds
Stiff father son competition saw Simon managing to hold off David to take the overall race, Alan again applying wind knowlede and guile to take second in his Graduate. Firther prizes for juniors sailing RS Fevas, Toppers and Opies.
Pirate games and Pirate Pete’s Treasure Hunts saw juniors (and a couple of parents) paddling around the Flash following Pirate Pete’s clues and red herrings to find a hoard of gold chocolate coins, Pirates then went on to build dens and consume their winnings.
Hot food, Pirates Punch, and other welcome refreshments were organised by the parents group in the club house,
Upgrading the Safety Fleet
Our Fleet of Coach /Safety /Rescue / Assistance boats was sorely in need of upgrading. The old Dory affectionately known as “The Black Pig” had been holed and sunk too many times and was beyond repair so was scrapped last winter. The remaining little white Dory was unstable with water trapped in the foam between the hulls. A few years ago it tipped two model boater’s into the Flash, so was considered unsuitable for general duties. the two O Boats now named “Arthur” and “Reg” after our founders are just what we need for most duties, but with 30 Juniors we need a fleet of about 4 Coach boats for Friday Evenings. The requirements for RYA Power Boat 2 training also looks for a wheel steered boat that can reach planing speeds.
We set aside some of the Covid Grant monies to upgrade the fleet.
First a wheel steered Dory. RIBs are not really suitable for the Flash and a bit delicate for our pontoons, Simon,Brian and Nick started trawling the internet for suitable Dorys. With cathedral hull these make very stable boats both at speed and stopped. They are not so good as RIB in big waves but that is not a problem on The Flash. After much searching and comparing ideas we homed in on the Dell Quay 13′ Dory. several examples were viewed on line and a couple of examples written off due to ageing engines. Simon finally tracked down a contender in Devon with original gel coat a reasonably new four stroke engine and a nearly new road trailer. Chris was on a long weekend break in Devon so went to view the boat and check the engine ashore. A deal was struck well within our budget and Chris towed our new Dory back to the Flash.
On the Flash the Dory has lived up to expectations. Some minor problems with dirty fuel were quickly solved by Brian and Nick. With wheel steering, electric start and a fitted bilge pump the Dory is very initiative to use for car drivers. It’s stability is also remarkable.
Replacing the tippy little white Dory was a stroke of luck. O Boats are sought after for their proven robustness and stability. Simon spotted a couple of rare examples on E bay. One in Crew came without trailer and engine at a very reasonable asking price. We have suitable spare engines and the trailer which came with the Dell Quay Dory was suitable. So Simon arranged a viewing. Pete sorted out the EBay side of things and Chris went along as driver. The boat was in better condition than we could have hoped for at the price so a deal was struck, the boat loaded onto the trailer and back to the Flash within a couple of hours. Judicious use of a soldering iron fixed a couple of deep gouges in the deck, the missing bungs were replaced and the outboard bracket refitted.
Trials with the Model Boater’s electric outboard and the larger petrol outboards have been successful. Primary this OBoat will be kept afloat as recovery boat for the Model Boaters also as a fourth coach boat for dinghy training. The Model Boater’s who have tried it have been very impressed with their new boat.
Buying both boats we have used less than half our original budget and the quotations for a new boat store next to the container are very reasonable. Most of all the club now has a safety fleet which will serve well for many years to come.
Names for the new boats have been mooted: Rodney (after Rod Evans) for the Dell Quay Dory and Harry (after Harry Bainbridge) for the new O Boat, honouring both Rod and Harry’s long commitment to the club.
The tippy little white Dory is now up for sale.
Toilet Block Phase 2 Completed
The new windows and pebble dashing of the toilet block has now been completed. Thank you to Karl and his team for all their hard work clearing a route around the building, stabilising the walls, fitting the new windows, rendering with lime based render then pebble dashing the wall. A vast improvement from the mouldy block work we had before. With the outside walls now water resistant we are allowing the walls to dry out before we start the next phase, refurbishing the interior, over the winter.
Along with the new boat house and the refurbishment of the club room our programme of building works for this spring /summer is now complete. Members and visitors have been very complementary of the upgrades to our facilities.
The next phases of building works will be the re plumbing the interior of the toilet block and building a boat shelter next to the container for the additional rescue boat.
SUP The Future, Social Sundays are here.
Our trial of Stand Up Paddle Boarding came to an end on Sunday 20 June. Over 100 people have enjoyed Paula’s Introduction to Stand up Paddle Boarding. Many more have come to the club with their boards and enjoyed our “warm and friendly”, “sociable” Sundays. We have also started mixing the paddle boarding with social sailing and model boating. Social Sundays here we come.
During the trial we made a few mistakes, none too serious and we learned a lot. We have also welcomed several new members who are also now joining in with other club activities. So where next?
Running the SUP sessions has taken a lot of volunteer input, particularly having to run a booking system for visitors and temporary members through the current covid restriction. Our systems need updating. We also need more volunteers to open the club on a Sunday morning, prepare the safety boat and close up at the end of the day.
- SUP will run alongside Social Dinghy Sailing and Model boating.
- Access to the Flash will be for full members only.
- There must be either a safety boat on the water or another paddleboarder on the water in order for you to SUP safely at GSC
- We need a group of named volunteers to open and close the club and prepare the safety boat.
RYA level 1/2 Dinghy Courses 2021
With Covid restrictions slowly easing we are now planning to run the following RYA Adult Dinghy training courses. Normally we have a class of between 6 and 8 students but given the need for social distancing we will need to work on a one for one basis so we will have to limit the first course to 3 people. We will review numbers for the second course nearer the time.
RYA Level 1 course 18 & 25th July 2021, *Fully Booked with reserves
RYA Level 1- Level 2 course 15th & 22nd August 2021
The course is only open to members. The course fee is £60
To book a place please contact:- secretarygresfordsc@gmail.com
The Juniors are back and the Goslings are hatching
18 Juniors from 11 Families joined us for the first night of Junior Sailing this season many for the first time. It was also lovely to see older juniors returning to brush off and develop their skills after the lost season we had last year. Nick Simon and Brian are now supported by our growing group of aspiring instructors Lucia, David, Elin, Katy and Isabel, All of whom have been sailing with us for many years.
It was also a pleasure to welcome back former juniors now returning as parents.
Mean while our Canada Geese have hatched their first brood with six goslings. The nest by the slipway still has 2 eggs,and is barrier to give the geese a bit of space. The swifts have been around for a few weeks now and a blue tit has nested in the clubhouse wall.
Gresford Sailing Club 