Felixstowe Rowing Club (FXRC) was formed in March 2021 and is primarily a coastal rowing club using 32 foot long, coxed, 6 oared replica Cornish Pilot gigs for estuary and river rowing.

FXRC currently has about 55 members and is an open club for male and females aged 18+.

The club is based at Felixstowe Ferry Sailing Club at The Ferry, Felixstowe.

Access to the River Deben and the coastal waters off Bawdsey and Felixstowe promenade is year round (subject to favourable weather conditions).

Our first rowing gig, the “Saint Felix” has been a regular sight off Felixstowe since the spring of 2021 now with several 90 minute sessions running midweek and weekends. She was joined this year by St Etheldreda, an identical gig.  "Ethel" was launched in June 2022.

We are delighted that A & S Recruitment of Felixstowe has agreed a 3 year sponsorship of our first gig, Saint Felix.

3PL, also a thriving business based in Felixstowe, are our sponsors of  Saint Etheldreda, also on a 3 year term.

Now "Ethel" is here, we have met the demand for more sessions and membership has grown to 55 very active rowers.

Weather  permitting, each member can expect the opportunity to row at least one session per week, and frequently more often.

Fancy a try? It is fair to say that pretty much all the current members were beginners to gig rowing when they decided to give it a go. We keep coming back for more as we love getting out on the water and enjoy each other's company and the feel good factor that gig rowing is giving us.  

The particular benefit of gig rowing at Felixstowe transcends a physical workout as the connection with nature, the positive effects of new friendships, teamwork and enjoyment is incalculable.

So we welcome new people to try out on a non-obligatory basis. Please have a look at our membership section for further details.

Please note we cannot accommodate rowers aged under 18 years old (for 2022 & 2023 at least) as we must train more coxes to deal with the demands made on us by the current adult membership.

The Felixstowe Rowing Club was started by Terry Davey, Lyn Gameson, and Joel Early after they had a few drinks one night, and thought that Felixstowe really should have a gig rowing club.

The Felixstowe Rowing Club (FXRC) officially launched on 10 th April 2021 when we pushed our new gig (‘St Felix’) into the river Deben off the Felixstowe Ferry shore for our first row.

St Felix is a fibreglass replica of a Cornish Pilot gig, which makes it less expensive and easier to maintain than traditional wooden gigs, which are built to an exacting standard. Pilot gigs have a Coxswain plus 6 rowers. In addition, there is a Pilot seat, which traditionally was used to take a ‘pilot’ (someone with good knowledge of the local waters and hazards) out to a ship to help guide it safely into harbour. As only one pilot was required, competition between gigs was fierce, as each
tried to be the first to row their pilot out to the ship.

Although Cornish Pilot Gig clubs are associated with the West Country (particularly Cornwall and the Isles of Scilly), we see the FXRC not so much as introducing Pilot gig rowing to Suffolk, as resurrecting a tradition: the old eighteenth and nineteenth century ‘Beach Companies’ of the Suffolk and Norfolk Coast (whose activities included salvage and life-saving) also used Pilot gigs and they were almost identical to the West Country boats.

‍

‍

Why does the club logo have a bishop’s mitre?

St Felix was the first bishop of East Anglia (7th century), who was praised for delivering "all the province of East Anglia from long-standing unrighteousness and unhappiness".

We often row past, or even over, the remains of Walton Castle, (only visible during very low tides), which included a church connected with St Felix; even today, a few locals call the castle remains the ‘Church Rocks’.