Everyone you ask has a different response as to why they are interested or taking part in the J.P. Morgan Asset Management Round the Island Race.It means so many different things to so many different people and there is always that hope that your boat will win the much prized Roman Bowl.
Here are a few of the very different entries for the 2016 version of the Race:
Ian Bowker and friends on High Hopes, one of the regular Dubois half tonners, unmodified with original mast, keel and rudder. They have plenty of experience in this event, having completed four consecutive races up to 2014 with a regular crew.
Safram, a 35ft high tech full carbon Swiss-made catamaran, is designed for winning inshore races on lakes. For example, in 2015, she won on Lake Geneva (Switzerland), on the Lake Balaton (Hungary) and on Lake Garda (Italy).
In 2016 the Safram team is racing this ‘super cat’ for the very first time on open waters and has selected the J.P Morgan Asset Management Round the Island Race to prove Safram‘s skills as a classy all-rounder. The skipper, Rodolphe Gautier, is a seasoned racer and also the Chairman of the Organising Committee of the Bol d’Or Mirabaud.
A unique inner-city multicultural project helping disadvantaged young people in London is represented in this year’s J.P. Morgan Asset Management Round the Island Race on a 1981 German Frers 45ft sail training boat named Scaramouche, a former Admiral’s Cupper no less. She will have eight students on board.
In 2013, Greig City Academy (GCA) set up a school sailing club to allow inner-city London students access to the sport of sailing. Over the last three years nearly 1,000 students have taken to the water for the first time. Today the GCA Sailing has bases in King George V Reservoir in London with a fleet of 6 dinghies and Poole Harbour, Dorset with the McGregor 22 and Scaramouche. Did the inspiration for this yacht’s name come from the band Queen?
Photos supplied by the JPMAM RTI Press Office.