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Royal Thames Team Racing Report

The team racing season began with a lot of expectation on the newly ordained Royal Thames team racing team having had a successful year including winning BUSA Championships and coming second on tie break at the National Championships sailing as Cambridge University.

The team had a solid start to the new season at the London 6-pack at Welsh Harp making it to the semi finals before losing out in the in tricky light conditions. The next event was the Oxford magnum with another good performance again reaching the knockout stages against a strong field and being knocked out by the eventual winners West Kirby.

 
After a few events not quite managing to go the full distance the Bristol Brew at the beginning of November looked like it was going the same way with poor conditions stopping play half way through the Sunday. The trophy was awarded to West Kirby and it was only on Monday morning the organisers realised they had given it to the wrong team and the Royal Thames were the rightful victors! This success was followed in the new year by the Carmela Cup in the docklands where 2nd place overall sailing this time as Cambridge University was enough to secure the universities trophy from BUSA and Oxford.

 
Next up was the BUSA qualifier and a clean sweep of every race with first and second place before heading to Oxford to try and defend the Top Gun Trophy. The previous week illness had forced long standing team member and former captain Rob Style to step aside with his place taken by Rachel Wigmore the week before the event, leaving little time to solidify as a team before the event. Never the less an excellent performance in the first round robin not dropping a single race was a strong foundation for the weekend, resulting in being first equal on points at the end of the preliminary rounds. Again the team was disrupted on the Sunday afternoon when Rachel was forced to leave to fulfil a commitment taken on before joining the team, leading to a loss in the semi finals with a stand in helm. A disappointing end to an encouraging weekend.

 
Next weekend sees the London Duck, again at Welsh Harp and then the Cam Cup before BUSA finals over Easter and then the big event - The Wilson Trophy in May.

The team would like to thank the Royal Thames and specially Marcus Vivian for their support over the year. Hopefully we can bring you back some more silverware!

The team racing season began with a lot of expectation on the newly ordained Royal Thames team racing team having had a successful year including winning BUSA Championships and coming second on tie break at the National Championships sailing as Cambridge University.

The team had a solid start to the new season at the London 6-pack at Welsh Harp making it to the semi finals before losing out in the in tricky light conditions. The next event was the Oxford magnum with another good performance again reaching the knockout stages against a strong field and being knocked out by the eventual winners West Kirby.

  After a few events not quite managing to go the full distance the Bristol Brew at the beginning of November looked like it was going the same way with poor conditions stopping play half way through the Sunday. The trophy was awarded to West Kirby and it was only on Monday morning the organisers realised they had given it to the wrong team and the Royal Thames were the rightful victors! This success was followed in the new year by the Carmela Cup in the docklands where 2nd place overall sailing this time as Cambridge University was enough to secure the universities trophy from BUSA and Oxford.

Next up was the BUSA qualifier and a clean sweep of every race with first and second place before heading to Oxford to try and defend the Top Gun Trophy. The previous week illness had forced long standing team member and former captain Rob Style to step aside with his place taken by Rachel Wigmore the week before the event, leaving little time to solidify as a team before the event. Never the less an excellent performance in the first round robin not dropping a single race was a strong foundation for the weekend, resulting in being first equal on points at the end of the preliminary rounds. Again the team was disrupted on the Sunday afternoon when Rachel was forced to leave to fulfil a commitment taken on before joining the team, leading to a loss in the semi finals with a stand in helm. A disappointing end to an encouraging weekend.

Next weekend sees the London Duck, again at Welsh Harp and then the Cam Cup before BUSA finals over Easter and then the big event - The Wilson Trophy in May.

The team would like to thank the Royal Thames and specially Marcus Vivian for their support over the year. Hopefully we can bring you back some more silverware!

The Royal Thames team racing team is Jonathon Pinner, Tom Heywood, Rachel Wigmore, Bethan Carden, Simon Wood and Megan Burrough.

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