ST. AYLES SKIFFS REGATTA

Ross Chappell

MARGARET RIVER

ON THE WEEKEND OF January 23–24, St. Ayles Skiff crews from the Club competed in the annual regatta at Margaret River. The Augusta Club had completed its two new skiffs, so together with our Dotsie and Ripple there were four boats available for racing.

Events were conducted for women, men and veterans and the main event was for the Margaret River Cup. Our men had the misfortune to break an oar. However our veteran crew aged about 80 years had an outstanding win. The accompanying photo of the finish (bottom right), taken a few seconds after our crew had crossed the line and stopped rowing, shows that they had won by more than 3 lengths from the other three significantly younger crews.

Our veteran rowers were Ross Chappell (83) stroke, Gavin Bunning (79) 3, Rob Campbell (75) 2 and Rob Perrin (79) bow, with Judith Deiderick cox. Well done!