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All race reports for Alex Barrell

Event: May Bumps 2010 - Wednesday
Posted as: A. Barrell
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As per usual, bumps brings mishaps aplenty before the racing even begins. M5 rowed past us at the King's boathouse cheering, at which point we reminded them (in not a particularly kind way I admit...) that they were supposed to leave their boat at the P&E for us to take. Honestly... :P Then by the lock, a Clare rower managed to find a way to break his blade - rather unsuprisingly they then got bumped.

Ah yes, the race. We set off well; a nice solid and quick start before settling on rate 34 with a fairly decent ratio. Anglia Ruskin II were crabbing somewhere in the distance, so we knew this was going to be between us and Tit Hall III. Despite a solid race with us rowing "at least twice as well as them" - Miles Galloway - We couldn't seem to get under half a length of them. Oh and there was our rather spectacular line around grassy which saw bow side blades eviscerating a king's crew, but we can ignore that (yes its my fault for not getting catches in...).

Lets get them tomorrow guys. YEAH BUDDY!

Event: May Bumps 2010 - Thursday
Posted as: Alex
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POWER! Awesome row guys, ARU II gave us a bit of a fright, but we didn't panic and put in a great bumps push to secure victory. More of the same tomorrow please!

Event: May Bumps 2010 - Friday
Posted as: Alex
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Another good effort guys, once we closed to within a length we put some work down and finished em off well. The actual bumps push was maybe a bit wobbly, but we had built up enough speed that it didn't really matter too much.

Hopefully tomorrow we can build on our start, with some legs and power calls during the wind and once again get a quick bump. According to Sam Jackson "Catz are a bunch of pussies". What a witty guy...

Event: Putney Bridge to Kings Cross Tube Challenge 2011 - Tube Challenge
Posted as: Alex
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Having disembarked the District line train full of optimism, my dreams were quickly crushed upon arriving at the Piccadilly platform to find no trains up on the timetable. I waited patiently, managing not to swear at any more members of the TFL workforce. After about 3 minutes, the board said a train would be arriving in 2 minutes. The first few stations went by rapidly, but after Piccadilly Circus it got fairly crowded, which clearly slowed me down.

Overall a solid performance despite the conditions. Next time out I'm convinced there will be a better result.

Event: Lent Bumps 2013 - Tuesday
Posted as: Barrell
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Reasonably solid race. An unspectacular start kept us just within station as Maggie got a rather suprising whistle on Churchill in front of them. We closed a bit through the corners but not enough to draw a whistle out of Iain. Finally we got to within a length by plough reach after a succession of pushes of various effectiveness, at which point Maggie began to blow up.

Ending it then would have been the easiest, and most would agree the obvious thing to do. However we figured we needed more practice at rate, so spent the next 3 minutes closing in. Jon at stroke, who was not feeling great, was very thankful for this decision...

Event: Lent Bumps 2013 - Friday
Posted as: Barrell
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The plan was to set off hard and attack Churchill. Unfortunately it turned out we had no idea how to do this. Even more unfortunately, Maggie behind us did.

With some good advice from Iain - "Settle into your rhythm", which I translatd as "Stop rowing like twats" - we held them at overlap before pulling away down plough reach after they nearly forgot to take Grassy, then blew up rather spectacularly.

Better start needed today.

Event: Lent Bumps 2013 - Thursday
Posted as: Barrell
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Considering we didn't get a whistle on Churchill, I wasn't sure how effective our race had been. Seeing a crabbed blade and someone chundering behind us after the finish showed we had pushed them quite hard.

Really good performance, even if we had nothing to show for it