3 knots of wind and 1 degree celcius (if we are lucky) can't wait. At least there isn't any fog forecast.

Sounds pretty boody to me too!

Whatever happens afterwards???????? And it usually does, I know my head will hurt on sun morning nay sun pm cheers ALLLEEEEZZZZZZZZZZZZ!!!!!!

It's 8.20 am Saturday morning and it's snowing 20 miles west of QMSC!

You must be interest or you wouln't be posting this at 8:20

10.30 am and snowing even more heavily in Cookham but not settling...yet. I'm one of those geeks that turns my PC on as soon as I get up so the earlier message merely indicates that I awoke at  about 8.15 am! 

Fortunately I haven't bought a boat yet so I'm under no moral pressure to sail in the Bloody Mary, I have done several times in the past and was always beaten by the Cadets and Mirrors.

I'll probably be there, for the finish anyway.

PS Pseudonyms are pseuds.

Vague and admittedly unsubstantiated reports of snowdrifts on the M 25 have persuaded me to stay at home and watch the TWO episodes of 'Star Trek: The Next Generation' on Sky this afternoon. Good luck to all those intrepid M/R sailors who will be launching shortly.

snow, no wind amd mist was in the cuddly comfort of the Midlands.  God knows what its like in the foreign, barren territories elsewhere.

Still 19 Merlins biggest fleet by far 

Wot a great bit of sailing from Mr Blithell, no stopping the Thames Rater from winning

Congrats

Well done to all MR's who turned out today! Delighted that we formed the largest class of 212 boats from 60 different classes there.

Stu Blithell & Andy 'Taxi' Davies sailed a blinder and were 2nd, robbed by the Thames A Rater.  Jude & Phil were 12th, with Duncan Salmon & Ian Garwood not far behind.

John & The Chairman jacked it after 1.5 hrs having completed 2.1 legs of 7 legs of the course.  No stamina.  Others retired through boredom or cold!

Still an excellent showing from the class.

GGGGGGGGGGGG

And it is an ex Merlin Sailor, Cruncher Hunter, who won it

And, blowing our own trumpet, Natt was 2nd Junior helm overall.
Well done us!

Lord knows where we came, got stuffed by a load of 14's and some ponse in a 49er thing on the finish line claiming to have water from 50 yards behind us!! Had a good sail though and thanks to Ben Archer for being my light weight crew!
Well done to Martin on the win and Stuart on a great second!

At least I had a good excuse for not being there as I still haven't got the car back so no towbar!  Well done everyone.  If John Harris had competed would he have won it?  I'm sure no-one tacked more than they should or came out of a tack faster than they went into it ;->

Including Mark rounding, I think we gybed 5 times, and tacked 4 times in the whole 2 and half plus hours, as there was not a lot of wind, and as tacking or gybing meant uninstalling myself from under the foredeck and Natt going behind the mainsheet, I think more damage was done in the maneover and was to be avoided unless the shifts were so big. 
The race was won by the Rater due to the suitability of its rig, and of course Martin and teams undisputed sailing skills. 
People betting either went to the edge or went to the middle, those that went to the middle won the bet. 
We took the middle ground, consevative, straight line approach trying to consolidate what I thought was a spot on start.
Several boats (hardly any Merlins I may add)were breaching rule 42 through body 'kinetics, I think QM would have been wise to have had an on the water judge, given the situation, as it is difficult for competitors to make an accurate call.

Has Martin won the Bloody Mary before in his Rater? He's certainly been trying for a good many years.

You should all should try sailing a Rater, I guarantee that you'll enjoy it.

I'm not sure John would have done well at QMSC, he finished 5th at Tamesis yesterday. The modern boats are learning how to do it in light and fluky conditions and there are some good sailors at Tamesis nowadays.

The year that Martin 'won' it in the Thames Rater, they discovered that as no returns had been made to the RYA so it didn't qualify under the SI requiring a PN to compete. They changed the SI after that year to allow the rater. 
I think Martin protested the decision, as you would expect of him, but lost.
I think they had to adjust the SI this year again to allow for the fact that some other boats had also been dropped from the official list (2.4s I think).

Well congrats all but I'm gutted!  Stuck in bed on Friday/Saturday with rotting guts and projections from both ends.  Not only did I miss my own birthday drinks, but otherwise I would have been on board the A-Rater.  Don't think Martin's won it before...

I agree you should all try a rater - very different yet strangely similar and you shouldn't criticise what you don't know.  Just 'cos they're optimised for those wind conditions, shouldn't mean it is regarded as stealing the event.  Far from it.  Optimum for those conditions I say!

I would agree with that. You could not have picked a better boat for the conditions! They are great fun to sail too, but look out for the transom when tacking as it swings round alot wider than you would expect.

They certainly look trick!

Hi all,

Just for the record, 

Martin Hunter has finished in the following positions in previous Bloody Mary races whilst sailing in a Thames A class Rater: 9th 3rd. 2nd and now 1st. He also finished 6th in a GP 14 some years ago, all in all, not a bad record.

Glad to hear that you are feeling better Deepy - hopefully we can do it all again next year.