SAILING: GREY conditions and a light wind greeted a large fleet of boats at the Chester Sailing and Canoeing Club.

The leading boats were Peter Had-field and crew Liz Whitehead in a RS200 and Sally Hazlewood in a Laser.

The rest of the fleet packed round the first buoy with much contesting for space, then drifted in the windless conditions until halfway across the river when the boats came out of the wind shadow of the trees.

One of the upper buoys placed close to the bank was also a contested mark, and Hamish Collin then Mike Kneale had to use delaying tactics to round the buoy without causing a collision.

Mark Roberts in a Laser nearly caught the leaders, but by the end of the race they were half-a-lap ahead.

In the second race, the same two leaders went ahead of the fleet with Roberts in third place. In the middle of the fleet there was a contest between Kneale and Collin in Lasers, John Edwards and young crew in a Graduate and Steve Harrison and Joanne Spreyer in a Hornet. Kneale pulled away on the final dash to the finish.

The final placings for both races were first Hadfield, second Hazlewood and third Roberts.

It was the second week of the Frostbite Series at Gresford Flash on Sunday, with a west to north-west breeze becoming fresh at times.

In race one of the day, all of the boats got off to a good start with the GP of Les Tucker and crew Gethin Morris taking an early lead.

The Mirror of Jim and Jessica Young was not far behind at this stage of the race, but the larger GP managed to pull away from the rest and win by a considerable margin. The Youngs' Mirror retired on the last lap.

Race two of the day saw Tucker make a good start from the favourable end of the line with the Mirror, sailed single-handed by Young who did not read the line so well and was a little slow to get going.

These two boats had considerable difficulty rounding the number five marker buoy down by the fisherman's seat corner of the Flash, but the GP mastered the fluky patch first and managed to pull away.

Young lost a lot of time after he hit the number five marker buoy and had to do a 360-degree penalty turn.

Tucker claimed first place and Young was second. No other boats managed to finish this race.

Members are reminded to be at the Flash a little earlier on Sunday to rig their boats before the Remembrance Day observance.