The weather today proved to be windier than yesterday, with the odd shower dampening the atmosphere at the second day of the Lymington Town Sailing Club J-Class regatta. However nothing could diminish the unequivocal sight of three Js sailing hard in a good breeze.

The course set today was the same as yesterday, but without the late wind shift, the line proved to set an excellent beat down to the windward mark. Shamrock V made a bold move to start on port tack, cutting across Endeavour and Velsheda, giving the older, heavier and slower J extra ground on her younger and swifter counterparts. Though it didn’t take Endeavour long to regain that hard-earned margin, and soon she was stretching her lead on Velsheda, which seemed to be off the pace.

It looked like Velsheda had a poor sail plan, perhaps having gone with the wrong headsail for the conditions, but changing sails on a short course would cost more time in the long run. Sail choice for the day was a combination of mains, staysails and yankees. Shamrock V was restricted to using her Asymmetric off the wind after blowing out her kite yesterday. Not wanting to be the only one with a full set of sails, Velsheda’s crew popped their kite when the spinnaker pole pushed through the fabric on the hoist.

On the leg to the wing mark set off Bournemouth, Endeavour extended her lead further, before leading the Js on the run past South-West Shingles and across the finish line at Hurst Narrows. Velsheda followed Endeavour across the line ten minutes and twenty eight seconds later. With the two leaders both sailing scratch on a handicap of 1.0, while Shamrock V sails on a handicap of 0.987, her finishing time was corrected to just four minutes behind that of Velsheda. A great improvement on her time yesterday, while Velsheda needs to pull something special out of the hat if she wants to beat Endeavour.

The final race of the regatta starts at midday tomorrow. With Endeavour and Velsheda both on three points and Shamrock V on six, tomorrow will decide who walks away with the Sir Thomas Lipton trophy. The outlook for tomorrow is unsettled but probably brighter than today with the promise of fresh winds from the west-nor’west.