How to master the weather at the British Rowing Beach Sprint Championships

Following the 2025 British Rowing Beach Sprint Championships, Fergus Mainland spoke with Events Manager James Lee about how to deal with often unpredictable weather the coast can conjure up

Hello, James. Congratulations on a hugely successful British Rowing Beach Sprint Championships! This year, the weather played a big factor leading to a change in location at the eleventh hour. When did you first realise the conditions at the original beach would make racing impossible, and what was the process for making the call to move?

“We are always monitoring forecasts from a couple of weeks out but of course the nature is they get more accurate, the closer they get. As it happened, I was in the area the weekend before for the bank holiday weekend and Beach Sprints Head Coach Tom Pattichis was also in the area as they were due to be training there. So we were able to monitor the local conditions, both where we were due to be, in Bournemouth, and also in Studland.

“We started discussing on the Monday morning, and made a commitment to make a decision by Wednesday so competitors had plenty of time to change their plans. As it happened, the forecast on Tuesday wasn’t showing improvements so a group of us got on a call together (with Tom P providing live footage from Bournemouth) to discuss our options. It became clear we had three options. The first was to remain in Bournemouth with a very high risk we’d have to pull it on the day. The second would be a move to Studland to give us the best possible chance of running, although still some risk, or the third option which was to cancel completely. None of us wanted to do that final option, and it was just too high a risk”.

What contingency planning goes into preparing for unpredictable weather in a sport so tied to the sea?

“It’s a really fine balance with the coastal / beach sprint events. In one sense, you want a bit of rough weather to make the conditions a bit more exciting – but you also want sunshine to encourage the spectators. Ultimately, compared to say a 2000m multi-lane race, the beauty of beach sprint events, is that you can move them relatively easily – to find a better piece of water. So it’s an awareness of what our limits are and what conditions we could still run in.”

How do you balance safety concerns with the desire to keep the event running, and who ultimately makes the final decision?

“The safety of participants (competitors, coaches, volunteers, spectators) is always the number one priority. Sometimes, you have to push the limits slightly, particularly with beach sprints where it’s still relatively new and we’re learning what sort of conditions competitors can deal with. Their skill level is improving too, so they can deal with worse. But, it has to be safe. We know that when we’re running an event, we’re providing an environment that’s often more safe than a normal training environment because we’re bringing in safety boats, medics and have lots of marshals and spotters around.

“In terms of a decision, we always try to make sure it’s a group call. We gather views from the various key people to make sure it’s informed. Ultimately, as Event Manager, it’s my final call, but I’d never make it on my own and I was lucky on this occasion that there was some very knowledgable people around me, and we all tested each others thinking.”

What steps did you take to ensure the racing remained fair for all crews despite the last-minute change of venue?

“The nature of beach sprints is that it isn’t necessarily always going to be completely fair! The venue change in itself didn’t make any difference to that. We knew we needed a beach where we could set the right course – both on the land and on the water, and Knoll Beach has been used several times before. There is ongoing monitoring of the course on the water during competition to keep it fair, and we always get lots of people telling us if it’s not!”

What tools, forecasts, or local knowledge do you rely on when tracking weather conditions in the lead-up to the championships?

“A bit of everything to be honest! For me, the most important piece in this situation was the local knowledge. A forecast is all well and good, but what does that actually mean in terms of sea state. As we found, a venue just nine miles away from the original venue was ‘rowable’ when the original venue was not. That only came from knowledge of people like Tom Pattichis and Lucy Hart who knew that Studland provided shelter given the wind speed and direction that was forecast.

“Forecasts are all well and good but, at the end of the day, they are predictions. All too often you can see completely different forecasts for exactly the same place. Also, as I mentioned earlier, they get more accurate the closer you get to the event, but you need to make a call before that. We couldn’t have moved things on the day, and we needed to give people a few days notice to change their arrangements. You always have to try and make a call before you’ve necessarily got the most accurate forecast.”

Despite the challenges, what feedback have you received from athletes, coaches, and spectators about how the event turned out?

“So far, it’s been overwhelmingly positive. I think people understand that if it had stayed in Bournemouth, it would have been off. Studland was still challenging without a doubt, but we got every single race done, and awarded every single medal. There were lots of things around the event that we didn’t get to do on this occasion but ultimately, the racing is the main priority and if we can keep that safe and fair, then it’s almost job done. Even when the rain was at its heaviest on Saturday, competitors, volunteers, supporters were still all getting on with it, with a smile. It was quite incredible really.”

Thanks James. Enjoy a well earned holiday and good luck with preparations for the next event, the British Rowing Indoor Championships!