Thanks to Ian Davies for the reminder…
The Boxing Day Tug o’ War takes place again this Christmas in Hoylake. It’s an annual competition held at mid-day (High Noon!) between Hoylake Sailing Club and Hoylake Lifeboat crew and takes place on the beach outside the sailing club. Ian says:
“even though it is fiercely competitive between us, when the announcement is made in the club house regarding the results the tradition is ‘this years winner is Hoylake’. As it stands the sailing club are winning 17 to 16 so we want to win to equalise this year. Although the tug o war results only equate to 33 years the competition is annual, some years we have had football or rowing with a twist!”
John,
That’s interesting! the link to last year’s post by Tom Singleton got me thinking.
I thought that I would just clarify a few points! I have looked at the “The Slater Trophy” which is a silver teapot and engraved on it is that the first event was held in 1972 and it was held every year to 1994. During the years 95 – 99 inclusive there wasn’t a Tug O’ War event but the “sport” of choice was either football in waders or a daft rowing competition. This means that this year will be the 39th year since the competition started but 34th Tug O’ War event.
What happened to yhe tug of war on Boxing Day?
The Tug O’ War was cancelled this year as the condition of the beach was rock hard frozen! The RNLI took their 19ton Talus tractor down and thought by contra rotating, turning on the spot that this would turn up the beach like it normally does but on the day all it did was polish the ice! So it was sadly mutually decided that cancellation was the only option. We are very sorry for the disappointment as we know lots of people wanted to see this event, but lets hope next year isn’t the coldest Boxing Day for 101 years!