Hayling Ferry Sailing Club is a small, friendly club, superbly located at the western tip of Hayling Island. From our well equipped club house, our fleet of catamarans and monohulls enjoys some of the best sailing in the Solent and the south coast of England.
New members are always welcome whether you own a boat or not.
It's always a shame when we don't get to race especially after making a real effort to get to the club. But if there's any doubt that it was a bit too "heavy" yesterday please have a look at the graph below. Back in 2020 I plotted the wind speed, gust, and direction as recorded by Chimet for a couple of windy races both of which were at the limit of what any of us were OK to sail in. I hoped to get an idea of what we'd experienced for comparison and for future reference.
Another memorable race, this time in the harbour with a blustery and shifting WNW F4-5 providing a challenging sail. The course was set for 2 laps of NW Sinah and Bridge channel marks with the usual club start/finish. Technically, 4 boats were out although in practice 3 boats raced, with Ian and Amanda happy to cruise on their sensibly reefed Pacific. Kieron and Brent on a club SL16 were blasting along and would have finished well if they'd sailed the right course while Dave gave a masterclass in singe-handing a club Dart 16 in the testing conditions.
A glorious warm, sunny, breezy day. The course was set for 3 anticlockwise laps of Fairway, Outer, Inner with a final port turn around Fairway. Conditions were pretty good with a steadily building F4-5 S veering SW, although it was heavy going at times on the upwind leg from Inner to Fairway. Three laps was hard-work but satisfying and the race time was within our usual target or 1.5 to 2 hours. Despite a slow start dealing with technical issues, Richard and Justin made short work moving up through the fleet and beating the other 2 F18s convincingly.
The race report and full results of the 2023 Solent Forts Race are now available on the SFR 2023 race page.
Congratulations to this year's Orange Fleet winners Grant and Adam Piggott, and to Dan Jarman, winner of the Blue Fleet race!
Photos of the event are available from Lotte Johnson Photography.
A good year for the Island Cup! A great turnout of 11 boats enjoyed a reasonably warm NE F4-5. The course was set for an anti-clockwise first leg along Hayling seafront around Fairway and West Pole and up Chichester Harbour to the bridge.
Paul and Charlie (Dart 18) got the best start but the downwind speed of the spinnaker boats helped them get to the turn around Fairway first and leave the flood tide in the channel holding the rest of the fleet back.
Registration is now open for the 2023 Solent Forts Race, taking place at Hayling Ferry Sailing Club over the weekend of the 3rd and 4th June. The weekend will follow a similar format to previous years with a practice race on Saturday afternoon, followed by the Band on the Beach party in the evening, with the main race taking place on Sunday.
Congratulations to Steve and Jennie who won the first race of the season. A pursuit race around marks in Langstone Harbour proved tricky for all with the tide and a shifting breeze helping and hindering in equal measure. Richard and Dave enjoyed an impressive start on the club SL16 only to find themselves becalmed at the start of their second lap. The marks were hard to spot from opposite sides of the harbour which was a particular challenge for Fen and Adrian on a club Dart 16. The sun shone for a bit and the breeze was at times half-decent. Not a bad start to the year.
RYA training for HFSC members has been scheduled for the following dates:
Saturday 3rd June sees the return of our epic "Band on the Beach" event. Good food, fine beer and wine, and great music make for a truly memorable summer night. It's the biggest and best club social of the year so get your tickets now to avoid missing out!
The 25th June sees the return of our epic "Band on the Beach" event. Good food, fine beer and wine, and great music make for a truly memorable summer night. It's the biggest and best club social of the year so get your tickets now to avoid missing out!
