[CUCBC Contacts] Fwd: Mobile gantry, Riverside Bridge, River Cam, Monday 12th to Friday 16th May

[Will Richards]

Dear All,

I recently received an email (attached) inviting Cambridge to send a team to 
the Irish International Currach Championships, which will run from Friday 8th 
to Sunday 10th August in Omeath in County Louth. Accommodation, meals and 
transport to and from Dublin or Belfast airports (not to mention a generous 
quantity of Guinness) are provided - you only need to pay for your flights 
(if you live in Ireland then you don't even need to pay for those).
Other teams competing include Oxford, a couple of US universities, and a 
number of currach clubs from across the US and Ireland. 

A currach is a wide, keel-less sculling boat with thole pins instead of 
riggers and gates (so you can't feather the oars) and fixed seats. They're 
made from canvas stretched over a wooden frame and are therefore much lighter 
than clinker-built tub pairs, but obviously don't really compare with a 
racing shell. The lack of keel or rudder makes them quite difficult to steer 
in a straight line, but you can use this to your advantage since there is no 
rule against nudging your opponents off-course. More information can be found 
on http://www.currach.org or, of course, on Wikipedia.

Having got you hooked, here comes the bad news: they currently only have 
funding for a team of four (two men and two women, to make up a mixed quad as 
well as smaller boats like doubles and singles) and the men's slots went 
within an hour when I forwarded the email to the CULRC list. CUWBC, however, 
don't seem to be so keen on freebies so the women's spaces are still open. 
If you're interested and female, contact me - I'll allocate places on a 
first-come, first-served basis. [That sounds a lot more dodgy than it did in 
my head.] If you're male and want to be put on a waiting list in case they 
get more funding and more places become available, also contact me.

-- 
Christopher Kerr
St Catharine's College
Cambridge CB2 1RL

CULRC Hon: Sec: 2008-09

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