Stawell members were keen to make the trip up the highway to check out Horsham Yacht Club's facilities that are currently undergoing refurbishment, but a poor opening race resulted in plenty of work to do.

Race one started shortly after 2pm as a shifting breeze from the South East filled in.

Local knowledge seemed to help two Horsham Laser skippers, Steve Marcroft and Anthony Schellens, who made an excellent start.

They continued to sail ahead of the fleet for the next two legs.

The two most celebrated Impulse dinghy sailors from Stawell, Johno Knight and Ross Bennett, eventually managed to catch the lead Horsham skippers.

The rest of the field were some way back, struggling with the fickle wind and were not able to bridge the gap.

The wind speed and direction did stabilise towards the end of race one, but the four lead sailors were in a race of their own.

Line honours for the race was eventually taken by Horsham skipper Steve Marcroft with the two Stawell racers not far behind.

On handicap though, the race winner was Ross Bennett in his distinctive pink hulled Impulse dinghy named 'In a Pink fit', with fellow Stawell sailor Johno Knight in second place and Steve Marcroft sailing the Laser in third.

The rest of the fleet were well spread out due to the light and unstable wind conditions.

In the second race of the day, the wind had started to settle in to a more consistent direction and strength.

It had also shifted its direction which meant that the more common and favoured starboard end of the start line was abandoned by most of the competitors as they elected to sail on a port tack at the left hand end of the line.

This meant that they would have a better sailing angle towards the first windward mark, but placed them on a collision course with any boat sailing on a starboard tack (wind from the right hand side of the boat).

Boats sailing with wind from the right hand side means that they are on a starboard tack and have right of way. Luckily for most, the wind stayed constant for most to clear the start line without incident.

The second race was similar in overall line honours to the first race, but because the wind remained stable for the whole race, the field was much closer in overall finish times.

In standard tradition for two race events, the poor performers in the first race were boosted by a large handicap advantage in the second race.

This saw Stawell sailors Tony Hillier and Leigh Edwards being awarded first and second place respectively in the Stawell and Horsham Toyota event.