It was a barrel of laughs when teams competed in a barrel race on the Bury Lake at Rickmansworth Aquadrome on Saturday.

The rival teams, which each paid £15 entry money from funds donated by sponsors, had to row their way out to a line of buoys,  navigate round them and steer the barrels back to the shore.

“Most people were surprised how unstable the craft were. It is the first time we have done it,” said Mr Nigel Clark, a member of the committee of Rickmansworth Round Table, which organised the event.

Mr Clark had the idea. Brewers Benskins sponsored it, awarding a firkin of beer and £60 in prize money to the winners.

They were the Rickmansworth Sea Scouts who also took third place in the final with another team. Rickmansworth Round Table’s own team were second. Nineteen teams competed altogether.

The sponsorship money will be used to take 14 children from the district on an outward bound holiday in Snowdonia in July.

There was an added boost for charity as the sea scouts said they would donate one third of their prize money back each to the Round Table and Rickmansworth Church tower appeal.

[From the Watford Observer of May 31, 1985]