In my opinion you can never have too much tinsel at Christmas.
That idea was reinforced in my mind by the competitors at this year’s RYA Winter Championships in Largs who went all out decorating their boats for the last event of 2019.
It’s become tradition at the Winters that whoever has the best decorated rig wins an extra prize at the end of the event and it’s become more competitive than the actual racing.
Before launch, all 63 crews spent an hour wrestling with lights and dressing both themselves and their boats up.
I opted for the classic of wrapping tinsel around the bottom of the sail with fairy lights duct taped alongside it.
I’ll admit that mine definitely wasn’t the best but I like to think that’s because my boat isn’t as big as some of the others there and so I didn’t have the same room for creativity.
It also looked much better when it wasn’t partially submerged in the ever freezing Largs channel.
The Winters is typically one of our windiest events and this year was no exception, but nothing cheers up your fifth capsize of the day quite like some strangely resilient fairy lights.
Even with the windy weather and the driving hailstones, the Winters is always my favourite event of the year. It’s far more informal than other events in the year so we’re able to play around with different race shapes.
This year’s race committee decided to put is on a sausage course, which was an interesting choice but certainly narrowed down the number of potentially dangerous manoeuvres we had to do in the stormy conditions.
After three races I finished overall in 2nd girl position and 6th overall which I entirely put down to the encouragement provided by the tinsel, even if it was a bit tricky to get on.
Team GBRn't 