Helena Lucas presents trophies at Round the Island Race prizegiving
More than 15,000 sailors took part in this year’s event off the Isle of Wight
Hundreds of competitors gathered at the Island Sailing Club (ISC) in Cowes on Sunday to celebrate another successful J.P. Morgan Asset Management Round the Island Race.
Winners from the 84th edition were presented with their awards by Paralympic sailor Helena Lucas at the prizegiving event yesterday.
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The team moved briskly through the presentation of trophies and salvers plus race partner prizes, with sailing secretary Chris Thomas co-ordinating proceedings on-stage with the rear commodore sailing and race PRO Mike Peskett.
Dave Atkinson, speaking on behalf of ISC’s Race Management team, commented that yesterday’s race provided a classic Round the Island Race day for the 120 volunteers and the 15,000 plus sailors taking part.
He said: “We were blessed with great weather and good winds. Whilst there were a number of racing incidents, these are not uncommon when you have this number of people out on the water.
“However, given the co-operation of all the agencies that work alongside us, everything was handled with the utmost professionalism and skill and also dealt with quickly throughout the day.”
All of the 1389 boats that finished were across the line before the scheduled 10pm cut off, with only 104 retirements and 11 OCS/DSQ out of the initial 1,584 entries.
Thousands of spectators in Cowes and around the Isle of Wight as well as on the mainland enjoyed great views of the action.
And those who couldn’t make it to the race were able to watch the day’s event for the first time via the RTI TV channel.
The new initiative launched by the ISC and J.P. Morgan Asset Management and some Race Partners, provided live commentary and footage of the starts interspersed with competitor interviews and weather information.
Next year’s J.P. Morgan Asset Management Round the Island Race will take place on Saturday July 2, 2016.