29 September 2003

The Royal Natal Yacht Club's Windhoek Regatta ended yesterday with the final event, the famous poitjie competition, taking place on the RNYC lawns.

The regatta comprised of two round the cans races, a pursuit race, a bay race, a cryptic clue challenge and finally the poitjie cook-off. It requires a wide range of skills and consistent performances in all the disciplines to come out on top of this regatta, which is exactly what the crew of the Leisure 42 Ocean Sailing Academy managed. They were never particularly flash on the water, but they weren't bad either and improved slowly as the regatta went on. Off the water though they were on fire winning both the cryptic clue challenge and most importantly the poitjie competition.

It was a close run thing though with the Fast 42 Skitzo, slightly better on the water, not at all hot in the cryptic clue and solid in the poitjie with a 4th place ending in the runners up spot less than 3 points behind the leader.

Whether you won or lost though this was mostly a regatta to have fun in. There was a bit of something in it for everyone with light winds on the first day, a moderate easterly and big sea for the pursuit race and a howling westerly for the final bay race. In between there were some very big parties and a lot of fun had by all.

The poitjie was without doubt the highlight though with many crews going out of their way to impress the judges on all counts including presentation.

Smooth Sailing popped down to the club on Sunday afternoon to have a look at what was going on and I have to say that I was amazed at the amount of effort that went into the poitjie. There is a link to pictures of the contestants in all their glory at the poitjie competition below. Whether you were there or not it's definitely worth having a look to see just what went on.