Contest III marked her 20th birthday with a hat-trick of wins during May 24 fitted dinghy racing in St George’s Harbour.The Royal Bermuda Yacht Club (RBYC) dinghy made a clean sweep of Heritage Trophy, Anniversary Cup and Leon D Fox Cup honours to add to the special occasion.“Contest III is celebrating her first full season of sailing this year,” commented skipper and RBYC vice-commodore Somers Kempe. “She was delivered in July, ‘91 and her first full season was the next year.”Kempe said the key to the team’s May 24 success owed much to a well-drilled and patient crew.“The boat went well and the crew (Roger Mello, Will Thompson, Rockal Evans, Dimitri Stevens and Butch Agnew) were patient to get around the course,” he added. “We picked our moments to tack and always waited for a little pressure.“It was a great day although it was shame it was a little cloudy. But other than that I thought the racing was fair and everyone had a good time.”This year marked the tenth consecutive year Contest III has won the coveted Heritage Trophy.“Ten years in a row with our name on that trophy is extraordinary,” Kempe said. “It’s very extraordinary and there isn’t any other dinghy that can claim that.“This is a great achievement by the crew, some of which have been sailing for the whole ten years and longer.”Kempe said one of his team’s main priorities this summer was to defend the coveted Coronation Cup awarded to the top dinghy at the end of the season. “The crew is pretty confident with the way we are sailing and we know what the boat can do,” he added. “We have a good core group of crew and we are just going to take it one race at a time and try to eliminate the mistakes.”Kempe is due to compete in next month’s Newport-Bermuda Race, leaving someone else to helm Contest III in his absence.“This year we are going to try and introduce some new faces on the helm and spread out some of the load a little more,” Kempe said. “Peter Miller will probably take the helm and William Thompson and Adam Barbosa will likely be around.“Peter has been in the boat so he knows what the programme is all about. We always try and run a pretty calm boat and everyone sort of falls into that.”Fitted dinghy racing resumes this Sunday at Granaway Deep.