GEORGE SAILING NEWS - The annual George Lakes Yacht Club inter-club regatta takes place on Sunday 11 October with the first race starting at 10:00.

The difficulty of compliance with Covid-19 regulations has necessitated compacting the normally two-day event into one day.

At the first races after lockdown, eight boats competed for the Commodores Trophy and three Optimists for the De Klerk Trophy.

The first race was started from the end of the jetty, but this proved to be unwise as the starting area was in frequent wind shadows. The committee boat was then activated to set a more normal start in the middle of the lake for races two and three.

In race one the Dart 18 of Hans Delport was able to get well ahead of the mono hulls. The Finn of Brett Gething was the leading mono hull, until being passed up the second beat by Georgou Divaris on a Laser. They got ahead of the Fireball of David Laing and Anthony Alant. For the other Lasers, Henry Paine had an initial big lead ahead of Malcolm Osborne, until being passed up the second beat.

Maurits Lammers had to retire due to equipment failure.

In the second race, up front once again was the Delport Dart 18. Behind, there was close competition between the Fireball, Finn and Divaris Laser. The Fireball managed to finish just ahead of the Finn, with Divaris close behind.

In race three, Divaris succeeded in taking line honours, managing to sneak in just ahead of the Gething Finn.

In the junior fleet Ayden Gething established good leads ahead of the other two Optimists in all three races. JP Buys scored all the seconds ahead of Tristan Boshoff.

On class handicap ratings, Divaris was the winner of all three races, with Brett Gething taking all the second spots. Malcolm Osborne and Henry Paine tied on points for third place.

'We bring you the latest George, Garden Route news'