Saturday 28 July 2007

West Riding man wins North Riding Duck Race


Posted by Chris
A crowd of around 200 people turned up to watch this year's North Riding Duck Race and we sold out of ducks.

The race was won by duck No 65 bought by Saddleworth man Mr Roy Bardsley. Second place went to Ben and Zoe Fountain of Guisborough, with duck No 29 and Ashley Seaman of Redcar won third place with duck No 19. Roy Bardsley will receive the Colin Holt Cup and a Yorkshire breakfast pack and tea towel from Hilary Holt at the Saddleworth Yorkshire Day celebrations being held tomorrow (Sunday) in Uppermill.

The best named duck, chosen by YRS NR Group Chairman, Jim Lince of Thornaby, was duck No 126 "You rang Mallard?" bought by Andy Crawford of Marske.

As organiser of the race it was my job to shepherd the ducks along the 500 yard course, releasing those that had got snagged.

The end of the race was quite tense because an upstream wind at the finish held the ducks back. There was a loud cheer when I released debris stuck on top of the weir and Roy's duck rushed home.

We sold out all our 200 ducks thanks to the large attendance and could have sold lots more by having heats but we ran out of time.

£210 was raised for the YRS road sign campaign fund.

Note: Pictures taken by Derek Hudson of Marske.

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