Hollingworth Young Sailors in action at Salford

A competitor jumps Onboard

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There was fun both on and off the water at the OnBoard Fun Festival on 29 October at Salford Watersports Centre. 10 teams of youngsters from across the Region completed a range of wet and dry challenges on a mild day with good breezes.

47 children of ages five up to 17 came in teams from Burwain Sailing Club, Salford Junior Sailing Club, Hollingworth Lake Activity Club, West Lancashire Yacht Club, Astbury Sailsports and Glossop Sailing Club. All the children had learned to sail with the RYA’s OnBoard initiative, and all were keen to show off their skills in friendly competition.

The Fun Festival was the final event in the Manchester OnBoard series, and in teams of three to six kids, the teams joined in a number of tricky challenges. In one, the child steering the boat was blindfolded, and had to sail guided only by the instructions of his/ her non blindfolded team mate. Onshore, there was nappy racing, with kids wearing their buoyancy aids round their legs, and regularly tripping up! There was conventional fleet racing on the water, in which each team selected their champion to go into battle against the other team reps.

In all there were eight types of race, and five of the ten teams won one or more events, so competition was keen. The winning team were Astbury Popular, while Hollingworth and Burwain both showed promise in the fleet racing. West Lancashire took the award for youngest team, after including children as young as five in their team!

The organiser, RYA OnBoard Development Officer Adam McGovern said, “The weather gods seemed to be with us, which made for a fantastic day’s racing. It was great to see so many teams, plus such young kids joining in the fun. It was a really good way to finish the OnBoard season here in the Manchester area.”

Run by the RYA, OnBoard is a grass roots programme which introduces sailing and windsurfing to young people aged 8 to 18, through schools, youth groups and training centres.

Over a ten year period OnBoard aims to introduce a minimum of 500,000 children to sailing and windsurfing in the UK, converting over 10% of them into regular participants. So far it’s nicely on track.

For more information about how to get involved in sailing visit the RYA’s website www.rya.org.uk or the OnBoard website www.ruob.co.uk