The Viking Longboat Championships
Each summer RL360 supports the Viking Longboat Championships, held in Peel, in the west of the Isle of Man.
Teams from businesses and organisations across the Isle of Man, including a few fielded by RL360, compete in a rowing contest around the harbour in traditional Viking Longboats. The winning teams in each category, plus second and third places, receive cash prizes, all donated by RL360. All of this money is then donated to the teams’ charity of choice.
26th June 2021 saw the annual World Championship Viking Longboat Races take place in Peel Bay in the Isle of Man.
66 teams signed up to compete, split into three categories; men’s, ladies and mixed. With a 10 person crew rowing in a large Viking style boat, each team does a timed lap in Peel Bay competing to be the winner in their category.
There are 3 prizes in each category, 1st, 2nd and 3rd with prize money awarded that the teams then donate to their Isle of Man registered charity of choice. Having been proud sponsor for over 20 years, RL360 provide the prize money for each of the three top placed teams in the three categories.
There are also other categories that teams can compete for on the day, such as best newcomers, best pub team, best commercial team, best insurance team and best veterans team (plus others) to win trophies and beer. Then there is the overall World Championship title that everyone wants to be crowned. To make it a bit fairer there are time handicaps between the ladies, mixed and men’s teams so one of the winning teams in each category has a chance for the illustrious title.
24 of our own staff took part in the races forming three teams in each of the men’s, ladies and mixed categories under their team name of “Barbarians”. There were a mixture of experienced rowers and novice rowers who were taking part for the first time. Many of the teams who take part in the event compete every year, but it is heavily dominated by farmers teams known for their strength, which makes for fierce competition. Of course, some are also taking part purely for the fun of it with many teams rowing in fancy dress.
The most successful RL360 Barbarians team was our ladies team, who came 7th out of 20 in their category and also were awarded with the best insurance company trophy.
Two of our staff members, Jayne and Anne, also rowed in other non-RL360 ladies and mixed teams. Their ladies team, “Clarity Cougars”, were the winning team in the ladies category and with the time penalty taken into account also achieved the overall “World Championship” title in the competition.
The day started out rather chilly and the bay was looking very choppy, which would make rowing tough going, even for the strongest teams. However, everyone battled ahead and when the sun came out later on in the afternoon it made the event another roaring success with everyone saying what a brilliant day it was.
