What an amazing weekend Yealm have had at the World Pilot Gig Championships in the Isles of Scilly. Five of our teams raced over the two days aiming to finish as highly placed as possible in the biggest event of the sport.  We were gifted some dazzling sunshine but also some wicked winds and, on Saturday, the day of some longer races, some truly challenging seas.  Local coxes from St Mary’s assured me that they had rarely been out in such difficult conditions and it is quite a thing to race while watching your boat slowly fill with water - the stretchers getting covered is probably not the best of signs.  It was strongly rumoured that one of the other boats caught a fish on the row in.

Final positions were as follows;
Open (men’s) Vets - 18
Ladies Masters -  8
Open B - 91
Ladies A - 101
Open A - 21

All the crews and coxes put the work in to perform as well as they could and I’m sure the community have seen the boats out in all weathers over the winter.  As such, it feels a little wrong to single out one crew, but I will.  To come in the top 24 in these World Championships is a massive achievement and I do not know the last time the club did so well.  It is worth noting that, in the B group of 12 boats, all except Wasp (1994) were launched in the new millennium and only one of those before 2010.

Thanks to Phil, Antonia, Pete for coxing; committee members for organising, Phil for helping with the boat on the island, St Mary’s gig club for the loan of Bonnet.

Videos of the races are available at the YouTube Gigrower channel. Look out for Wasp or, for Open B, Bonnet (who’s bottle green and was built in 1830).
If you only watch one race, make it the Open final.

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I have been slow with updates but before the Worlds we had some other great successes.

The South Devon Winter league wrapped up in Brixham on the 22nd of March.  The ladies got to row in some pretty challenging seas before men and juniors were moved to a time-trial circuit around the harbour.  As ever the juniors were the stars with our older team winning the day and the league.  Our men’s A were pipped to a league win by a single point!

On the 12th of April the club raced at Dartmouth’s gig regatta.  This is a longer course out to sea and is well attended by about nine other clubs.  Our U16 team (made up of a majority of U14 girls) won the day and the U14s came second.  We also picked up a trophy in the mixed competition.

The day after Dartmouth, on the same day as the Oxford v Cambridge Varsity race, we held the inaugural Noss v Newton boat race.  Thanks to the support of our coxes, both the Swan and Dolphin Inns, a number of the club girls who ran the cake stall and the organisational skills of Beth McClements and Mairead McIntyre, we had a terrific evening of races.  Perhaps for the best in terms of village harmony, the final result was draw with Noss winning junior and mixed races and Newton the men’s & women’s.  Al Rooker has kindly shot and published a brilliant drone video.  Hopefully we can do it all again in 2026.

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Other than for fun, the reason for the boat race was to start a period of fundraising.  We’re first looking to purchase a new set of oars but are very keen to build funds and order a new boat.  This will give our race teams an extra edge that our lovely but heavy and 40 year-old current boats cannot.  Boat builders are also fairly local, master-craftsmen, so the money spent - around £30,000, will stay nearby.

Finally, the club is more-or-less at capacity at present with the limiting factor being our number of coxes.  We would love to have more coxes to support our rowers.  There are courses that can support coxing skills and the costs of these can be met by the club in the right circumstances.  I know that some newer rowers have really enjoyed their beginners rows and it would be greta to continue to support this.

Please get in touch if you can help with coxing, committee, fundraising or simply want to donate.

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