2020 Nationals - Cancelled

Dear member

 

The Committee hope that you, your friends and families are well in these challenging times.

 

 

As previously communicated, we have been keeping a very close eye on the Government announcements around the Covid-19 lockdown and how it may impact on our flagship 2020 event - the National Championships.

 

You will no doubt have seen the various extensions to the lockdown which were announced last week.  The Plas Heli centre is subject to the RYA Wales guidance, which was amended last week to include:

"RYA Cymru Wales alongside the RYA and the other Home Countries have extended the suspension of Organised Activity and Events until the 30th of June. " 

 

Given this statement, the centre is essentially closed until a day or so before our 88 entrants arrived.  Therefore, we do not believe the centre has sufficient time to allow the organisation of the event and setup safe social distancing protocols.  We are focussed on safety and cannot at this stage see how areas around safety cover could adequately be provided in a social distancing way.

 

In addition, Boris Johnson has announced that England (which is more relaxed than Wales) would not see any relaxations to hospitality until 4 July at the earliest.  This means even if the event were to proceed there would not be any socials or food options.  It may also be the case that members could not source accommodation either. 

 

Given these factors, the Committee's hand has been forced to take the unfortunate decision to CANCEL the 2020 National Championships.

 

We are really disappointed to have to make this announcement, but the safety of our members is paramount.  We hope you understand the reasons for the decision and have sufficient time to cancel any accommodation which you may have booked.

 

Note: if you are a nationals trophy holder, please keep hold of it for another year - you don't get to engrave your name on it for 2020 though ;) 

 

The entry conditions were very clear that there would be no refunds awarded.  However, the Committee do accept this is a very unusual and challenging situation and will of course be offering some form of refund (net of costs).

 

What we really want to do though is transfer your entry to the 2021 National Championships - these are taking place in Plymouth (Mountbatten centre) on 2, 3 and 4 July 2021.

We have been working hard behind the scenes and thanks to some excellent sponsorship from Hartley Boats and using some of the Association funds we are hoping to offer the current 88 entries a great incentive to move their entry across.  We have also managed to negotiate a generous discount on the accommodation at the centre - so it is already shaping up to be a great event.

 

The options for you will be communicated in the coming weeks and you will be given sufficient time to decide on your preferred option.

 

 

We are aware a number of clubs and classes are doing a lot of virtual sailing (hosting championships etc) and this is something we will be looking into for our planned nationals weekend.

 

If anyone has any particular experience of hosting these events then please can you let a member of the committee know.

 

We previously announced that all travellers events were cancelled until the Nationals.  The next planned event is Bowmoor at the end of July.

 

We are hopeful that it will be safe to run the remainder of the Noble Marine travellers circuit but this will need to be considered in due course (along with the inland championships) probably on an individual club basis.  The events will only go ahead if the Government guidelines support them happening and that the host clubs believe they can run the event safely complying with social distancing etc.

 

We encourage you all to support clubs during these difficult circumstances so they are there post Covid-19.

 

 

We hope that you all stay safe and thank you all again for your continued support of our exciting Class Association.