The fibreglass surf boats which punch through the waves at surf carnivals are not too dissimilar in shape to the boats which landed the Anzacs on the beaches of Gallipoli.
The basic hull design of surf boats has remained unchanged for over 100 years. The first rescue craft used to save lives was by the Sly brothers in Australia in 1905. They were fishermen from Fairy Bower and they used their fishing boat to rescue swimmers who had been caught by a rip and swept out to sea at Sydney’s Manly Beach.
Over time, the Sly brothers modified their craft, with changes to make the boat more manageable in bigger surf conditions. A longer oar replaced the tiller for steering, while the stern was modified to reduce the tendency for waves to impact the direction of the boat. The basic keel and bow design remain unchanged to this day.
The landing at Anzac Cove on 25 April 1915, also known as the landing at Gaba Tepe, and to the Turks as the Ar?burnu Battle, was part of the amphibious invasion of the Gallipoli Peninsula by the forces of the British Empire, which began the land phase of the Gallipoli Campaign.
The assault troops, mostly the Anzacs, landed at night on the western (Aegean Sea) side of the peninsula in various types of landing craft. The Allies hoped to seize control of the strategic Dardanelles Strait and open the way for their naval forces to attack Constantinople (Istanbul), the capital of Turkey and the Ottoman Empire.
Today’s fibreglass surf boats which are rowed in competition by crews in both New Zealand and Australian bear a strong resemblance to the boats used to land the Anzacs at Gallipoli in 1915.
1915
25 April First Gallipoli landings
24 May Temporary armistice to bury the dead
3 July Maori Contingent lands at Anzac Cove to join the NZ Mounted Rifles
6-9 August Battle of Lone Pine
6-9 August Battle of Chunuk Bair
23 October Sinking of the Marquette troop carrier
19-20 December Evacuation from Gallipoli
Red Beach Surf Club’s Commemorative Ribbon, printed with the names of individuals and families wanting to honour those who served at Gallipoli and those who gave their lives in battle following the landing on 25 April 1915, will soon make an historic journey.
The ribbon will be carried aboard the Red Beach surf boat as it makes its way along the Dardanelles, into the Aegean Sea and around the Gallipoli peninsula before coming ashore at a beach close to where the Anzacs landed 100 years ago. Forty-plus surf boats from New Zealand, Australia, Turkey, Britain and France will make the sea journey on two days set aside, 21 & 22 April.
It will be a proud moment for the 10 Red Beach rowers involved in the 70 km row who view the event as a poignant way to carry the Anzac spirit with them all the way to the beach landing.
The proceeds from the names printed on the Ribbon have gone towards funding a new surf boat for the club. It replaces the boat being used for the marathon row which will be gifted to a European surf club at the conclusion of the commemorations.
The ribbon will be presented for display at the Red Beach Surf Life Saving Club on the crew’s return to New Zealand.
To visit Anzac Cove is to stand at the very heart of Gallipoli history. On these shores, almost 100 years ago, stories of tragedy, heroism and camaraderie were forged.
Today, Anzac Cove is revered for its defining significance to the Gallipoli campaign. It is at this diminutive cove the Anzacs made their first Gallipoli landing on 25 April 1915.
It is nestled in Turkey’s Gallipoli peninsula and bounded by Ari Burnu and Hell Spit headlands.
8,556 New Zealanders served at Gallipoli
2,721 died (30%) 1,669 no known grave, 252 buried at sea
4,752 were wounded (55%)
50,000 Australians served at Gallipoli
8,587 died (17%)
19,367 were wounded (39%)
New Zealand 2,721 Australia 8,587 France 10,000 Britain 21,000 Turkey 86,000
It’s just two months to the historic centenary of the landing at Gallipoli by the Anzacs in 1915. Red Beach’s 10 rowers are continuing their training programmes and counting down to when they head to Turkey for the G100 event (see details further down).
Red Beach Surf Club rowers are counting down to the centenary of the Anzac Gallipoli landing.
With just two months to go before the group of 10 heads to Istanbul, Turkey, the final stages of preparation are under way for the iconic event. A Red Beach surf boat has been packed into a container and is now on a ship heading for Turkey.
The boat, using an interchange of the 10 rowers, will feature in the Gallipoli 100 (G100) event where 50 crews row over a 70km distance in the region of the Dardanelles, Aegean Sea and the Gallipoli Peninsula.
The two-day event includes racing and staging before the crews will pull up on a beach close to where the Anzacs landed 100 years earlier. The surf boats will be crewed by Australian, New Zealand, British, French and Turkish rowers.
Last month, the Red Beach club launched a brand new surf boat to replace the 14-year-old boat that has been shipped for the G100 event. “Both boats are identical in look and have the same sponsorship logos on the hulls. It’s hard to tell them apart,” said club executive officer Ross Malyon. “The surf boat on its way to the G100 event is in pristine condition,” he added.
Both boats recently featured in a row along the Hibiscus Coast on what was another training occasion for the 10 rowers who will head for Gallipoli in April.
After the commemorations at Gallipoli, the older boat will be gifted to a start-up surf club in Turkey to assist with surf lifesaving training which will help stem the high incidence of beach drownings in that country.
The replacement boat for the Red Beach club is being funded by proceeds to a special Commemorative Ribbon. This red ribbon will have a special poignancy as it will be printed with the names of individuals and families who wish to honour those who served at Gallipoli and those who gave their lives in battle following the Gallipoli landing in 1915.
It will be carried on the Red Beach boat during its journey to the beach landing and the commemorations.
For further details on the Commemorative Ribbon click here
Red Beach Surf Club has its very own ANZAC Girls … five young women who head for Turkey in April to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the Gallipoli landing by the ANZACs in 1915.
The quintet of Kelly Andrew, Ashleigh Jenkins, Nikki Darroch, Emma Stuart and Zita Talaic-Burgess are all competent rowers. Three of them have been named by Surf Life Saving New Zealand as members of the representative surf boat crew to row against an Australian women’s crew at the Trans-Tasman Surf Boat Challenge at Waihi Beach on 7th February.
In Turkey, they will be joined by five male rowers, also from the Red Beach Surf Club for the G100, a surf boat event which will see 50 boats row over a 70km distance in the region of the Dardanelles, Aegean Sea and the Gallipoli Peninsula.
The surf boats will manned by Australian, New Zealand, British, French and Turkish rowers. Rowing will take place over two days prior to 25 April (ANZAC Day) and the crews will proceed to a beach close to where the ANZACs landed in 1915.
You can have you name printed on a special Commemorative Ribbon which will be carried on the Red Beach surf boat as it makes it way to the landing point on the Gallipoli Peninsula. For further details on the Ribbon, click here
A special Commemorative Ribbon, printed with the names of individuals and families who wish to honour those who served at Gallipoli as well as those who gave their lives in battle following the Gallipoli landing in 1915, will be taken by the Red Beach surf boat crew to Gallipoli next April.
The proceeds from the names on the Ribbon will go towards funding a new surf boat for the club.
The Gallipoli 100 is a surf boat event taking place in April 2015 and will involve around 80 surf boats manned by Australian, New Zealand, British, French and Turkish crews. These crews will row over an 80km distance along the Dardanelles, Aegean Sea and the Gallipoli Peninsula. The crews will proceed to a landing close to where the ANZACs landed 100 years earlier.
Following the commemorations at Gallipoli, the Red Beach surf boat will be gifted to a start-up surf club in Turkey to assist with surf lifesaving training which will help stem the high incidence of beach drownings in that country. Donations to the Ribbon will go towards a replacement surf boat.
For the Commemorative Ribbon Request Form,
There are 3 easy ways to make payment …
A) Pay by cheque, made out to Red Beach SLSC, and send it with your completed Request Form to the club’s PO Box address.
B) Make a direct payment to the Red Beach SLSC bank account; the account number is on the Request Form. Be sure to enter your name as a reference. Email a scanned copy of your completed form to gallipoli100@redbeachslsc.com
C) Pay online to FundraiseOnline. Click on ‘Make A Donation’ then complete all details and enter your name(s) for the Ribbon in the Message box.
Red Beach’s ten surf boat rowers who head for Gallipoli next year couldn’t have been happier with their recent Anzac Day training row.
The seven-leg row began shortly after the dawn service at Browns Bay and took a course down Auckland’s East Coast Bays and into the Waitemata Harbour.
Four rowers and a sweep stepped into their surf boat in the pre-dawn darkness following a moving and uplifting ceremony at the Browns Bay cenotaph, right on the beachfront, attended by more than 1,000 people.
The three-hour journey saw the boat make stops at Mairangi Bay, Castor Bay, Takapuna, Narrow Neck Beach, Tamaki Yacht Club and the Viaduct Harbour, finishing at Devonport around 9.30am in time for a 9.45am parade and service.
Crew changes were made at each of the stops and the rowers were accompanied throughout the journey by a Team New Zealand chase boat.
Stunning autumn weather greeted the rowers with a warm day, smooth sea conditions and little wind. The Bays coastline provided a magnificent backdrop, as did the Auckland cityscape from the giant cranes at the container terminal to The Cloud, the Ferry Building, the Sky Tower, the Hilton Auckland Hotel and the Viaduct Harbour with its magnificent yachts and pleasure craft.
At the conclusion of the service at Devonport, crew members laid a wreath at the Marine Square war memorial in honour of the surf lifesavers who have given their lives in all conflicts since World War 1.
“The row replicated what we’ll be doing next year when we row down the Dardanelles over a distance of around 70km,” said surf boat captain Chris McCullough.
The race will be in six stages and over two days, April 23 and 24. The 80 surf boats taking part will be launched at Eceabat in the Dardanelles for the start at the narrow Kilitbahir – Canakkale strait. After leaving the Narrows start line the boats head into the Mediterranean and north to the finish at Ari Burnu, between Anzac Cove and North Beach where many Australian soldiers were based.
At Ari Burnu is a cemetery where some of the 2,721 New Zealand soldiers who died on Gallipoli are buried. Some were only 17 or 18 years old. Other bodies were never recovered or identified and still lie mostly where they fell on the battlefields of Gallipoli. The entire Gallipoli Peninsula has been declared a peace park by Turkish authorities.
The Anzac Day training row ushers in a training programme the rowers will embark on over the next 12 months before heading to Gallipoli.
Footnote: The Red Beach surf boat will be gifted to a start-up Turkish surf club to assist with its surf lifesaving endeavours. The Red Beach club is seeking sponsors to equip its rowers in Turkey and to raise funds for a replacement boat.
Call Chris McCullough on 021 612 304 or email gallipoli100@redbeachslsc.com
Red Beach surf boat rowers are preparing for next year’s commemorative race at Gallipoli with a special training row this coming Anzac Day.
The row, involving a team of 10, starts at Browns Bay with the 5.45am dawn parade and 6am service.
The seven-leg journey will take the surf boat and its crew to Mairangi Bay, Castor Bay, Takapuna, Narrow Neck Beach, Mission Bay and the Viaduct Harbour, finishing at Devonport in time for a 9.45am parade and service.
A chase boat, courtesy of Team New Zealand, will accompany the surf boat as it makes its way along the east coast bays. Crew changes will take place at each stopping point.
The Anzac Day row is part of the build-up for Gallipoli 2015. The Red Beach lifeguards will join their counterparts from Australia, Turkey, France and the UK in a special commemorative race marking the 100th anniversary of the bloody World War I campaign.
Eighty surf boats are expected to take part in a 75km row that will finish near the spot where Anzac troops landed in a barrage of Turkish gun and shell fire in 1915.
To help them get to Gallipoli, the rowers are looking for sponsors. Call Chris McCullough on 021 612 304 or email gallipoli100@redbeachslsc.com
To read the Rodney Times front page article, click here
A Red Beach surf boat, rowed by club lifeguards, will be one of many surf boats to feature in the 100th anniversary of the famous landing at Gallipoli by the ANZAC’s.
The Gallipoli 100, or G100, is a surf boat event taking place in April 2015 and will involve around 80 surf boats manned by Australian, New Zealand, British, French and Turkish surf lifesavers. The crews will row over a 75km distance, including racing and staging, with the location being the Dardanelles, Aegean Sea and the Gallipoli Peninsula. Rowing will take place over two days, 23 & 24 April. The crews will proceed to a landing near where the ANZAC’s landed 100 years earlier.
In 1915, many lifesavers and future lifesavers fought at Gallipoli, however, a number of the pre-war lifesavers did not return home.
Surf boats will be shipped to Turkey for the event and a number of them will be handed over to the Turkish surf lifesaving authorities at the close of the centenary celebrations.
One of the objectives is to continue the training of Turkish surf boat crews which has been under way since 2010. Another is to assist in developing a culture of surf lifesaving within Turkey, a country which has a particularly poor water safety record with many drownings per year around its stunning coastline.
To check out the Gallipoli 100 website and watch a short video on the event, click here