FOUR-OAR CRAFT: MINISTER’S GRANT TO GISBORNE CLUB

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXXV, Issue 22698, 24 July 1948, Page 6

FOUR-OAR CRAFT: MINISTER’S GRANT TO GISBORNE CLUB

To assist the Gisborne Rowing Club to finance the purchase of a pair of new four-oar racing craft, now on order from George Towns, the wellknown Australian builder, the Minister of internal Affairs has made a grant of £IOO from the physical welfare and recreation funds under his control. An intimation to this effect has been received from Mr. W. E. Parry by the district member, Mr. D. W. Coleman.

The club’s purchase will run well over £3OO in cost, and the new fouroars represent only the first instalment of plant renewal programme embarked upon by the club.

Boats now in use for club and regatta rowing are getting on in years, and though they were not in use during the war period, when practically every member of the club served in the armed forces, they have been subject to fairly heavy' depreciation, even when laid up. Changing Regatta Standards Included in the replacement programme are the ■ club and regatta double - sculling craft and the regatta four. The Gisborne oarsmen have an excellent clinker-built regatta four on hand, but its use in future regattas will be subject to a serious handicap owing to other clubs having ordered “new-look” boats which the New Zealand Rowing Association has agreed to admit to competition in regatta events. These new craft are plywood-built, and have a smooth skin wrapped on to the framework in the same way as the “Best and Best” championship craft. They are admittedly faster than' the clinker-built craft, and their acceptance by the New Zealand association was enforced by the fact that they are the only type now being constructed in Australia.

Old-Style Boats Handicapped The association w r as faced with the choice of placing a handicap upon the clubs which still hold good clinkers or of ruling out of competition in regatta events all clubs whose old-style craft have become obsolete through age or damage. The Gisborne club will have to make the change to keep abreast of the competition from other clubs in the district. The new four-oars for club work now being built by Towns to the order of the Gisborne club are plywoods. They will not be the first of the new type to reach Gisborne, for the P.B. Rowing Club landed two doublescullers last season. They were found to be extremely light, and more fragile than the old-style craft operated by both clubs. Oarsmen anticipate that - they will prove more difficult to main- f tain, for whereas repairs to clinker craft are within the scope of a reasonably skilful amateur the plywood skins of the new boats are a job for a skilled craftsman.