August 1982: Henley-On Todd

August 1982

THE HENLEY-ON-TODD REGATTA

The biggest event of the entire year in Alice Springs occurred on Saturday, July 28. The 21st annual Henley-on-the-Todd Regatta was held on the dry Todd River bed. Thousands of tourists and participants (an estimated 8000 attended the actual races) were in town from all over Australia and overseas and camera crews from, here in Australia, as well as the U.S. and Germany, were present.

The events started at 10:30 a.m. with a parade through town of all the teams and those bringing their own boats were carrying them. (I did not view the parade because I was getting some sleep after working my first mid prior to going down for the final events.) When I originally heard about this race I envisioned old canoes with the bottoms cut out but most of the boats are made of a very light frame surrounded by cloth - the lighter the better because it's -tough enough-running in that thick sand in the river bed without having to carry a heavy boat.

There were something like 100 teams participating (possibly including all events - both races and special events) and consisted in part of the following events:

a. A board on wheels running down a track on which a guy would lay on his stomach and push himself along to the end of the tracks (about 50 yards) where he picked up a girl on the board and then the rest of the team pulled them in using a rope attached to the board. This was the lifesaving-type event. .

b. A small-boat also on the tracks in which two guys "rowed" with oars pushing through the sand back and forth the 50 yards. On the way back, some of them could hardly push themselves along.

c. Ten-man (or woman) crews carrying something that really did look like a bottomless boat.

d. Larger boats complete-with sails that were carried by 12-person crews.

e. Bring-it yourself.boats (the others were provided) manned by 4-person crews.

Some of the special events included:

a. A beauty pageant in which at least three of the participants were American exchange students (one of which won). There was at least one ringer, a woman calling herself Miss Inflation. In past years some men have entered.

b. Sand shoveling contests in which the contestants had to fill a 55-gallon drum with sand.

c. Greasy-pole climbing. A pole about 25-30 feet high was greased and bottles of booze and champagne were hung from the platform on the top and teams tried to climb up on each others shoulders to reach the bottles.

d. The final event was a battle between three motorized ships each with about a 6-man crew. Ammunition consisted of water, flour bombs, confetti, and C02 from fire extinguishers. The boats have been around for awhile and one was a Viking ship, but with cannons, and two that looked like P.T. boats. By the end of the fight, the crews, boats and area where they fought were a mess. The end of the battle was when the ammunition was gone and by that time all three were bogged in the sand.

However, the real highlight of the day was.the Australia Cup, which came about in response to the America's Cup. This is a two-boat race between an Australian team and an American team. The Americans put in a lot of work training to uphold the tradition of always crossing the finish line first. However, they were disqualified, as usual (in. good fun). Last year it was for training on kangaroo meat, a joke on the fact that kangaroo meat had been exported to the U.S. under the guise of beef. This year they were disqualified based on a report by Penthouse magazine alleging that some illegal alien Americans had been flown in the week before on the U.S.A.F. cargo plane that comes in once a week. This was, in part, joking about the fact that this month's issue of the Australian Penthouse has yet another expose on Pine Gap, our base here in Alice Springs. Even a protest by the U.S. Ambassador to Australia, who was here as the honorary commodore, couldn't overturn the decision. One part that I didn't realize until later was that the Australian team were all employees here on base, also. Of course there was a lot of alternate booing and cheering by the Australians and Americans in the crowd.

Besides the races, there was plenty to look at. People watching was in vogue. There were about 400 motorcyclists in town for the Regatta and they provided some sights. (One team. in the races all wore motorcycle helmets.) There were also a lot of scantily clad young ladies (someone told me about them -'I didn't notice) and a lot of interesting T-shirts. T-shirts with messages/sayings, etc., are definitely "in" here.

The Henley-on-the-Todd may not be something you'd want to see year after year, but it was neat seeing this "world famous" event at least once.

Notes from the re-typing in 2011

The Henley-on-the-Todd event was started by the Alice Springs Rotary Club in 1962 (see attached section from the history of the Rotary Club of Alice Springs). However some years ago the major .sponsor became ASSA ABLOY, although all three Rotary Clubs in town participate.

There is still an event called-"Australia Cup" but in the 2010 program it says that it is "Invitation Only" and I am pretty sure it is not just the Australians against the Americans.

In 2000 Dwight and Brad Neider participated after going to the Olympics in Sydney. They were seen in some footage of the event on one of the networks in Australia.

The greasy pole is no longer an event.

Dorothy, as an honorary member of the Rotary Club of Alice Springs often helps by working at the-bar.