Punting Course Dates 2024

JP1: Junior Punting Beginners (school Y7 & above) – 6 places, £45
(fee includes Fine Boat supplement for the season)
Wednesday 15th May, 6:30pm for 6 sessions
This course is for children in school Year 7 and above. All participants in junior punting courses must have passed the Wargrave Boating Club swim test.

JP2: Junior Punting Improvers (school Y7 & above) – 6 places, £45
(fee includes Fine Boat supplement for the season)
Wednesday 15th May, 7:30pm for 6 sessions
This course is for children who have previously completed course JP1: Junior Punting Beginners. This course is for children in school Year 7 and above. All participants in junior punting courses must have passed the Wargrave Boating Club swim test.

AP1: Adults Punting Beginners (over 18) – 6 places, £70
(fee includes Fine Boat supplement for the season)
Sunday 12th May, 9:15am for 6 sessions
Lessons will be approximately one hour and trainees will swap on and off the water to give a total time on the water of around half an hour. All participants in adult punting courses must be over 18 and be good swimmers.

PR1: Punt Racing Training – 6 places, £70
Adults must have completed the beginners course and juniors the improvers course
(fee includes Fine Boat supplement for the season)
Sunday 12th May, 10:15 for 6 sessions
Adults (over 18) must have completed the Beginners course and Juniors (under 18) must have completed the Improvers course to be eligible for the Race Training course. Lessons will be approximately one hour and trainees will swap on and off the water to give a total time on the water of around half an hour.

Course participants should wear wet shoes or old trainers they don’t mind getting wet. You must be a member of the Wargrave Boating Club for the 2024 season to participate in any of the Punting courses and be able to arrive before the course to help get craft out, and stay afterwards to help put them away.

Wargrave Boating Club offers a unique insight to the mysterious world of Punting.
Punting done properly is probably the most elegant means of propelling a boat on the river.
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Our punts are very different to the wide, heavy and slow “barges” you see in Oxford and Cambridge.
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The Boating Club is lucky to have an excellent fleet of racing punts, which include relatively stable 2 foot wide racing punts and some needle thin (about 15 inch wide) “Best and Best” punts.

Why Best and Best? We hear that in Edwardian times, when Thames regattas had crowds approaching those of Premier League football, the fastest (best) punts were punted by the clubs’ best punters, hence the “Best and Best”.
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These days, there is still exciting punt racing to watch or compete in at a number of local events, including the Wargrave and Shiplake Regatta, the Punt Championships in Maidenhead and of course our own Rag Regatta.
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The Wargrave and Shiplake regatta attracts the best and most elegant punters in the country and is a great spectacle.