I Know lets go boating

YTRRC go to Sherborne

Nigel Parker AKA Fez came up with an idea to go to the Sherborne Fayre to go Dragon Boating Racing and have 17 members of the Running Club to put a team in. As the running club had so many experts we thought it would be a great idea and a mutley group was put together. To join the group you needed to know absolutely nothing about  boating and never sailed before. We were called "Running on Water".

The Crew

The Club Gazebo was erected and became the focal point for the Club, the Team Leader, Fez, sorted the Team out and after a team discussion it was decided that we would leave the Cider till after the first race and practice. We also talked about rowing but no one knew anything, but we did know about Somerset Cider.

We were Boat 1 for the first Race

Whats a Paddle??

A recce of the boats was carried out but this was useless as we did not know the front (Bow) bit or the back (Aft), luckily the organisers would help and told us where we need to seat on the boat and the way it was meant to point and we needed a leader to something with a stick and a mouth. Luckily we had Lindsay who had a big mouth and knew what to do with a stick. We decided to put her up the front as this was the safest seat on the boat. Phil managed to fall over in the boat

Still don't know how Lindsay didn't fall off 

  

It got complicated when Lindsay had to add up to two and repeat several times and then we had to react to what she said and put a paddle thing into the water and pull it back making the boat move and also soaking the person behind you. Seems easy.

The first bit was a practice from the jetty to the open water, once there we moved out with shouts of one, two, one, two. The idea was on one to move the paddle and on two do it again all at the same time with your fellow team members. Yeah Right!!

We thought the first bit was a practice but in fact it was our first Race and we did really well coming second with a time of 1min 25 secs and we were in 9th place.

When we got back to the Jetty it was off for a team discussion in the Cider tent. Then it was off for race two. With a bit of cider in us we were really up for this and again we came second but managed a PB by 5 seconds due to the shouts of 1,2 1,2 1,2 and the beat of the drum. We tried some stretching exercises to help.

Sadly we did not make the final but on our final race we did brilliant and came second yet again but with even more Cider in us. 

Final Scores

Then it was back to the Cider tent to discuss tactics for next year. It really was a great day out and everyone had a good day down at the lake. A must for next year and hopefully two teams from YTRRC.

Well done to Fez and Louise for all their work getting this together.

Full photographs can be seen here.