Ridgman Trophy Ten Bell Striking Competition 2009
20th June at Rickmansworth
The Ridgman Trophy is a 10-bell striking competition in honour of William J Ridgman, past president of the CUGCR and past General Secretary of the Ely DA. This year's competition was hosted by the Hertford County Association on a lovely sunny Saturday afternoon at Rickmansworth, a fairly nice sounding 10 but with enough odd struckness in most of the bells to challenge the mettle of all the participating teams and described by one of the judges as a typical Hertfordshire ring. Although, Bill Ridgman couldn't be present at the competition this year, it was nice to see him represented by his son Tom.
The judges for this year's competition were Alan Regin and Simon Rudd, and an excellent job they did too. The judges had a chance to ring the bells beforehand to a plain course of Stedman Caters and so as well as noting the odd struckness of the bells they commented on the 'interesting' climb up into the ringing chamber (more like a substantial ladder than just a steep staircase). The test piece was 209 changes of Stedman Caters (1, 6, 8s, 16/ 1s, 4, 6, 7, 10, 12, 17), a nice composition with a number of 6, 8, 10s and both front and back bell forward and reverse rollups.
The brief comments from the judges were as follows:
Team 1 An unsteady start which improved, 8 & 9 tended to push at hand causing a few of the faults
Team 2 Similar 8 & 9 handstroke problem coupled with slightly delayed tenor backstrokes, last 6 sixes particularly well rung
Team 3 Set the best tenor beat, good team ringing, slightly more edgy than their confident practice
Team 4 The word "brinkmanship" came to mind as they entered into changes with five seconds to spare causing a slightly unsettling effect to the start
Team 5 Steadiest pace of the teams so far but still some problems with tenor backstrokes and a small method mistake around the 6th and 7th sixes but the ringing brightened up following a good recovery
Team 6 Opening rounds in the practice looked like this band would nail it but actual test piece became one of an unfulfilled promise
Barry D Mack
(Published in Ringing World 5123-0693)