This event is now very much part the Royal London Calendar and it was good to see 14 entries this year. The regatta is now in its thirteenth year although the roots of the Windsor Medical Practice go back a lot further.

To be eligible to take part each entry “has to have one or more members of the medical and /or an allied profession, pharmaceutical, medical or veterinary related company on board”

There were two London members taking part, Andrew Jackson’s Fandango in the IRC division and Richard Gaunt with the ever-dependable Spoofer who won the ‘Endurance trophy’ (most time on the race course). Our Commodore mentioned in welcoming the participants on Friday evening that we seem to have a somewhat legal bias amongst our members! Perhaps Members with medical connections will take note and encourage those with sailboats to take part next year.

The whole event was extremely successful and with the strong winds having abated, it gave ideal sailing conditions for two races. With such a wide range of boats it is always difficult to get the courses to suit everyone but according to the competitors we did it on Saturday! 12 miles in the morning and 8 in the afternoon produced some close racing both on the water and on handicap. Thanks to Scottie’s swift action with the Club launch he prevented one of the competitors with a rope around their prop drifting on to RYS breakwater. Many thanks to my Race Officer team of Peter Dickson, Carol Cheek, and Mary Ann Barton. We amused competitors by providing pink flags to fly on their backstay; this made life so much easier to identify our racers on a rather crowded Saturday in the Solent, something to bear in mind for future events.

A very successful Regatta ended with the prize giving dinner in the RYS Pavilion where Professor Donald Longmore gave a brief history of the Windsor Cup and Amanda Butcher the Chief Executive of the J S T thanked everyone for their personal and financial support. Especially Henry Schein, suppliers of medical products, who sponsored the event and whose MD came third overall.

Rodney J C Barton CRO

P.S. The auction during the dinner raised a very good donation for the JST . One prize, 3 nights for 2 people in a luxury hotel. I did not see Mary Ann’s hand go up at £500. “ I was only helping a good cause, I knew I wouldn’t get it” she said afterwards. The hotel turned out to be in Argentina!