LOUIS MORRIS WINS UKWA INLAND 2016 ROUND 1 AT RUTLAND WATER AND MARATHON

Louis reports on another great race at Rutland!

“On 28-29th May it was the first event of the UKWA Inland series at Rutland Water. This event included the legendary long distance race: the Rutland Marathon, supported by Tushingham/Starboard/Severne. On Saturday we had two races in incredibly light conditions 3-7 knots with up to 80° windshifts. In fact, the second race probably shouldn’t have happened at all! It was about getting on the right side of the shifts and pumping like crazy, and I managed a 2nd and 1st, closely fought with Lewis Barnes and team-mate Rob Kent. We waited for 3 hours for the wind to improve, then managed one further race in 6-8 knots (which I won) before calling it a day.

On Sunday the wind was much better, but still pretty marginal, gusty and a bit shifty, so really tactical, and also really hard work to stay (or get) planing. These are generally my best conditions, and I took two more wins before having a really terrible start in the 3rd race, but I managed to fight back to 2nd place behind Rob Kent.

The weekend finished with the 10 mile long Rutland Marathon. With a northerly wind, it mostly consisted of reaching, which was tricky to get right, as Raceboards aren’t designed for reaching in marginal conditions. The wind was just light enough for us to keep ahead of the Formula’s, and after a terrible start (80 boards on a non-planing reaching start = hell!), I found myself leading. Rob Kent eventually overtook Mark Kay to take 2nd place in the Marathon.

So I won the overall event, and the marathon itself, using my Phantom 377 and XR-Race 9.5 in every race. My team-mate Rob was extremely fast all weekend on his Phantom 377L and XR-Race 9.5, and took second in almost every race!”

1st Louis Morris (Tushingham/Starboard)

2nd Rob Kent (Tushingham/Starboard)

3rd Mark Kay (Starboard)