IT’S been a few years, but Relay for Life’s Duck Derby is back.

Tomorrow afternoon at 3pm, 400 rubber ducks are set to be dropped into the water near the yacht club during Hooked on Portland, with the winning duck bestowing prizes upon its owner.

“The duck derby used to run prior to COVID and this year we’ve decided to bring it back, the teams for our Relay for Life event have been busy selling tickets for them and every duck has now been sold,” organisation co-chair Jodie Vaughan said.

“The winner will receive $700 in vouchers to various local businesses in Portland, second will receive $200 and third place will receive $100.”

Ms Vaughan, who is co-chairing alongside Kathryn Parsons, said Portland district’s Relay for Life, which is run under Cancer Council Victoria, has raised over $1.3 million for cancer research in its history, with close to $8000 raised this year.

The Portland event is on the move and this year will take place at Friendly Societies Reserve (soccer ground).

“The event runs for 12 hours from 10am until 10pm, and will be on March 16,” Ms Vaughan said.

“In the past it was at Henty Park, then recently got moved to Nelson Park, but we thought we’d try and bring it back into town to promote the event a bit more, so we settled on Friendly Societies this year.

“We have some live music during the event, and we’re very fortunate in that all our performers do it free of charge.

“We currently have 11 teams registered, and we’d like to get those numbers up where they have been in years gone by when there were 20 or 30 teams competing.

“It would be great to see more community organisations get on board and support the event, we’re really looking towards getting some corporate teams together this year.”

Ms Vaughan said any interested parties can sign up as a team or as an individual and be allocated to a team, with registrations available on the Relay for Life website.