The regatta due to take place at Chelmsford on Sunday 25 June 2017 has had to be POSTPONED due to a heavy weed growth in their river.

The organisers hope to reschedule for a later date this season - the new date will appear on the Summer Series page and will be be circulated to those on the FRA mailing list (sign up for mailing list) as soon as it is decided.

A good turn-out for the opening event of the FRA Summer Series, with 34 paddlers from Chelmsford CC, Leaside CC, Lee Valley Paddlesports, Bishops Stortford CC, and hosts HYM-COPS.

Early morning rain had given way to glorious sunshine by the time the 500m races started on the river. The paddlers transferred to the lake for the 200m races, in K1s, K2s and K4s.

GB Paddler Noah Dembele kindly came along to present the awards at the end of the day. After the medals for the day's racing came the presentation of the 1st, 2nd and 3rd place awards for the 2016 Summer Series as a whole, based on each paddler's best three performances in the four-regatta series (but with a minimum of two regatta entries to be eligible).

The full race results for the Stortford Regatta and the end of Series positions can be found on the Sprint Series Results page.

More photos from the day can be found in Angela's Flickr album, and (for FB friends of Chris Sze) Chris's FaceBook Album.

Many thanks to all the organisers and volunteers who have staged these regattas, and also the Team Leaders and paddlers who have turned out to support them. We hope to see you all again at the Winter Series Marathons which will kick off at Stortford on 6th November - see the Winter Series pages for details. If you sign up to the FRA mailing list you will be kept up to date on news about the Winter and Summer series.

Twenty-two paddlers took part in the third Regatta of the series, including teams from Leaside, HYM-COPS, Ealing and Stortford.

The morning consisted of 500m and 200m K1 heats. After the lunch break there was a 200m team relay, which was won by the group from Ealing.

The results from the Leaside Regatta are online, and also the series results to date. The final race of the Summer Series will take place at Bishops Stortford on 11th September, where the series trophies will also be awarded.

After lunch there was the opportunity for some to try out the K4s - and for the volunteer safety crews to practice their K4 rescue skills! Fortunately the day was warm and sunny.

The day ended with the usual the prizegiving. The full results can be seen on the Summer Series Results page,* where you can also see the competitors' overall series positions to date.
(*K2 & K4 200m times now added - 15/5/16)

The next regatta will be at Leaside on 7th August.

The Summer Series opened at Chelmsford on 23rd April. There were 39 entries in the key events: the  500m and 200m heats. Apart from a few sunny intervals the day was largely chilly but even a short icy shower did not seem to dampen the paddlers' enthusiasm.  A few extra paddlers joined in to make up crews for the K2 200m races. The racing finished with a 3000m K1  time trial.

The results can be found on the Summer Series Results page.

The next Summer Series Regatta will take place at Herts Young Mariners Base on 15th May. Series points from each race will be cumulated across the four races of the season, and series trophies will be awarded at the last race.

There was a good turnout of 59 entries for the Sprint Regatta at Stortford, and the day stayed fine and dry. After the usual 500m and 200m heats there were some 500m and 2000m K2 races.

It was particularly pleasing to see that so many people stayed for the prizegiving. Stortford Mayor Daniel Abbott was unfortunately called into work at the last minute and was only able to stop by the event briefly, but Deputy Mayor Councillor Colin Woodward gamely stepped into the breach and presented the awards.

See the results from the Stortford regatta and also the 2015 Summer Series class trophy results.