Down River Race report 2025

By Pippa Sellars

On Saturday, it was an enjoyable race, by the finish it was gusting more than twenty knots out in the Solent. It was an upwind start meaning some had to tack once or twice to enable them to get around the first corner. After only ten minutes of the start Simon Shaw’s main-sail fell down due to a broken halyard and he and his young crew had to sail ashore under jib power, that was one contestant down!  

At the beginning all the scows were quite bunched up and you had to really fight your way up to the front. There was a little questioning whether to sail in the middle of the river, where there was presumably more wind but we weren’t sure whether the tide was against us or with us, or to sail nearer the sides of the river,  where there would be less tide but also less wind. We stuck to the middle hoping that the tide would be carrying us down stream.

It wasn’t long before there was a break away group at the front with Jay in the lead, Cleo Johnson and her father nipping hot on his heels, we followed them and copied them for a while thinking that they were in the lead, probably because they knew something we didn’t.

After a while Jay and us escaped that group a bit and had a close sail upwind, we both chose to go to the left of the pontoon approaching Gins, Karl and Zoey Liebat in hot pursuit.

On the last leg downwind to the finish line we knew that we weren’t going to catch Jay up but we were also aware that we could be caught up. Jay managed to get planing – I didn’t think scows could plane but obviously they can – and was first to cross the line, us taking second place and Karl and his daughter achieving third. Along with Cleo helming an amazing race and holding it together the whole way and winning the Gayner Junior Scow Cup. Well done Cleo!