Sixty six competitors, aged under 19 and representing six sailing clubs, took part in the 24th Broadland Youth Regatta on Oulton Broad last Saturday.

The conditions were fine with a light north-easterly breeze and plenty of sunshine.

The boats were divided into four fleets, standard-rig Lasers, Fast Handicap, Toppers and Slow Handicap, and each had four races.

Then calculations were made to determine which club had the winning team and this year it was Horning SC who were victorious by a clear margin.

They had a small team of eight boats but their sailors were experienced and their girls did particularly well, winning the Laser series and coming first and second in the Fast Handicap.

The team from Wroxham was the biggest with 21 boats and they came second overall while Beccles took third place with a team of just five boats.

The team from Waveney & Oulton Broad YC, the host club, was relatively inexperienced with 11 of the 15 sailors never having sailed in the event before but they did extremely well to finish fourth overall.

The Nourse brothers were very competitive in the Laser fleet in which James finished third and Edward fifth.

Meanwhile 11-year-old George Madin, sailing his RS Tera Pro, was third in the Slow Handicap.

Eimear Rattenbury in her Laser 4.7 was the best placed Waveney and Oulton Broad sailor in the Fast Handicap and Felix Cripps was eighth in the 24-boat Topper fleet. Four of the team had never raced before and it was most encouraging to see how well they coped. The prospects for next year look very good indeed.

There were many candidates for the Lady Mayhew Trophy awarded for personal endeavour, with the trophy presented to brothers Luke and Alex Babbs from Rollesby.

The event was sponsored by Autoplot, AH Economics Consultancy Services, Norfolk Marine, Jeckells Chandlery, Optimum Time, Sam Cole Food Group and Olympic Print.

On Sunday, with speedboats racing on the Broad, there was the annual river race with turning marks at Burgh St Peter and Somerleyton.

Five boats took part, with Richard Smith and Andrea Prime finishing strongly in their Squib but the winners were Jordan Levett and Kyle Beamish in the Oulton Rater ‘Catastrophe’.