Fun Race For Home-made Rafts
This charity fun race for home-made rafts takes place in Portrush's Port Harbour, in Antrim. All vessels must pay a sum to enter the race, which then goes the Royal National Lifeboat Institute. Other eccentricities ensure that not only the raft must be self-designed, but also the costumes of the crew. Participants have dressed up as chunky chickens or drunken ducks for previous events.

The race doesn't take itself particularly seriously, to the extent that once a false start was declared but the rafts steamed ahead anyway, thus forcing the race to continue. There is always a fair amount of confusion over who wins too. Still, if you feel like getting into the spirit of things and fancy your chances, do contact the organisers at least two months in advance. When the rafting is over, this seaside resort town has plenty of quality restaurants to choose from, as well as shops and other general facilities. Nearby places of interest include Rathlin Island, Fair Head, Carrick-a-Rede Rope Bridge, Dunluce Castle and Dunseverick Castle.

The North West 200
It is a motorcycle race meeting held each May in Northern Ireland, using public roads. The circuit between the towns Portrush, Portstewart and Coleraine (the Triangle) is considered among the fastest in the world, with speeds topping 200mph, and enters the outskirts of those towns, passing many private houses. To facilitate this, street signs are removed at parts of the track and bales of hay used to wrap the base of lampposts and telegraph poles in case of an accident.

It is one of around fifteen events run on public roads between April and October throughout the island of Ireland. In 2006 it was the highest attended sporting event in Northern Ireland, with up to 150,000 people from Ireland, Britain, Europe and beyond descending on the "Triangle" for the week.

Practice nights are held on Tuesday and Thursday before the race. The race meeting on Saturday requires public roads to be closed during the afternoon. The meeting takes its name from the main race of the afternoon - the 'North West 200,' originally ran over 200 miles, before changing to its current format of six separate races each running 4-6 laps of the 8.966 mile circuit, 8.83 miles on the first lap of every race.

This forms part of the larger tradition of Irish road-racing and the Isle of Man TT races race weekend attracts thousands of fans, many of whom camp on fields beside the circuit. It is the largest annual sporting event in Northern Ireland, with over 100,000 visitors from all over the world every year. Many world-class riders have taken part. Arguably the most famous is the late Joey Dunlop, who has 13 race wins, but the event has been dominated in recent years by Englishman Michael Rutter, who has won 11 races from 1997 to 2006. Joey Dunlop's younger brother Robert holds the record number of wins at 'The Triangle', with 15 victories in his career

The Milk Cup
It is an international youth football tournament, one of Europe's premier soccer events, regularly attracting big national teams from five Continents like Brazil, Poland and USA as well as premiership squads such as Manchester United, Rangers, Newcastle United and Everton. In the Japan/South Korea world Cup of 2002 there were 30 Milk Cup veterans playing.

The cup matches are mainly played in the Coleraine/north coast area of Northern Ireland. The cup is run on a single match knock-out basis. It has three different sections, with entrants divided into age categories:
Elite - Under 19s - national sides
Premier - U17s - club sides and national sides
Junior - U15s - club sides and national sides

Many important names in international soccer have taken part in the milk cup, players such as David Beckham, Paul Scholes, Gary Neville, Nicky Butt and Wayne Rooney who played for Everton in the 2000 Milk Cup. The Northern Ireland Milk Cup began in 1983 thanks to Victor Leonard, then chairman of the Coleraine Youth League, Jim Weir secretary of the Northern Ireland Boys Football Association and former Glasgow Celtic, Northern Ireland player and manager, Bertie Peacock. The idea of a Northern Ireland based Youth Football Tournament gradually took shape.

Closing date for entry to the first Milk Cup was 31st January 1983, by that date there was only one application from outside Northern Ireland (Algerian National team) and only 5 applications from within Northern Ireland, after many hurried phone calls the 1983 Northern Ireland Cup took place with sixteen teams participating at under 16 levels. Motherwell from Scotland were the first winners. The competition was extended in 1985 when an extra age group, the under 14 section (Junior) was introduced and Glasgow giant, Rangers won the Milk Cup at that age level. The Under Nineteen section (Elite) which is an invitation only tournament was introduced in 1995 with the Welsh National Team being the winners.

Source:http://www.bbc.co.uk/
           http://en.wikipedia.org
           http://eventsuk.britishairways.com