You may be wondering how the allocation of people to boats will work for those not bringing their own vessel on the Raid. Now that you have all responded to our little survey on Rowing/Sailing preferences we have a pretty good idea what you want and we will do our best to provide it. In general people fall into one of the following categories:

1. Dedicated rowers who want to row all the way and don’t want a sailing rig on their vessel

2. Dedicated sailors who want to sail all the way and don’t want to touch an oar unless necessary

3. People who want to try a bit of everything

I don’t want to spend every night drawing up rosters and adjudicating disputes about who is in which boat. The plan is to make the boat allocation process self-organising. Every evening we will put up a sign-in sheet for each boat. Once all the seats in a boat are taken, if you really want to be in that boat, write your name in the reserve spot and go and speak to someone already in the boat and see if you can swap with them. The rules around this:

1. Be nice to each other

2. The sign-in sheet is part of our Safety Management System as it forms the manifest of who is on which boat

3. No-one is to erase or change the sheet without the agreement of the other person

4. No-one is to swap boats without informing the Beachmaster

5. If you find you have a preference for a particular boat, don’t be greedy about it, others may also want to experience it

6. Skiffs with sails are in short supply – if you indicated you want to row all the way don’t monopolise the one skiff that has a sail (Imagine)

7. Be nice to each other

Our tn17 fleet of LBT-owned/managed boats consists of three whaleboats and five St Ayles skiffs each with an experienced skipper in charge and 4-6 crew (that's you). All the whaleboats have sails and two of them (Swiftsure and the Montagu Whaler) have both sails and oars. The third whaleboat (Capricornia) has sails but no oars. The St Ayles skiffs are principally rowing boats, with only Imagine having the capacity for an optional sailing rig.

Everyone is encouraged to try a range of different boats. If there are any disputes over places, people who identified themselves as wanting to row only or sail only will be given preference for the rowing or sailing boats respectively. Those who said they wanted to try a bit of rowing and a bit of sailing will be given preference for swapping among boats to experience the full range of vessels in the LBT-owned/managed fleet.

A few people (a boat full) identified themselves as wanting to go on a skiff without a sail only – they will be easy to accommodate as we have four skiffs without sails. More people (two boats full)  identified they would like to experience a skiff with a sail – unfortunately we have not been able to rig a second St Ayles skiff with a sail for this Raid but with a bit of flexibility everyone who wants should get the chance for a sail on a skiff at some point.

Some people indicated they would like the opportunity to take one of the LBT’s smaller sailing boats. None of these boats are suitable for the most exposed southern legs of the Raid. We may have a one or two of the LBT Grebes available from Randalls Bay onwards, however, I am sure you will understand that with a small band of helpers our priority for preparing boats has to be those that can carry 5-7 people for the whole Raid rather than a Grebe which can only carry two people for the second half – but we will do what we can. The tn17 Safety Committee has decided Syrah is too tender to participate in the Raid.