LYME Regis produced some of their best performances of the year when they travelled to the fiercely contested Newquay Ladies County Championships last weekend, against 99 other gig crews.

Lyme Regis Gig Club’s A crew had their best ever championships, fighting their way through the qualifying heats, coming second in their first heat and in their second heat only missing out on a place in the quarter-finals by three seconds.

Lyme Regis’ A crew’s overall final position was an excellent and very creditable 25th.

The Lyme ladies B crew raced valiantly in worsening conditions but were knocked out in the first round of the competition in Cornwall.

The racing took place off the Newquay’s Harbour wall and was held over two days.

Starting on Saturday with a series of qualifying heats each of which saw six ladies crews competing around a triangular course, a distance of 1.8 gruelling miles.

The first two gigs from each race qualified automatically through to the next round plus a proportion of the fastest losers also won a spot.

Newquay Rowing Club hosted the very first County Championships in 1970 with their three gigs but since then the sport has grown to such a degree that they now borrow fourteen gigs from other clubs.

Lyme’s Rebel was one of these.

Each crew competed in randomly selected and unfamiliar gigs, which is a bit of a lottery as some of the boats can be in better race condition than others.

This year the event was won by Caradon A, who are also the Isles of Scilly 2016 World Pilot Gig champions. The home team, Newquay A came in second and Fowey finished third.

Lyme Regis Gig Club are set to field three teams in the Men’s Newquay County Championships, which takes place over the weekend of September 24-25.