The Club's Results

This was my first race, and second outing, ever with most members of this crew and so I was unsure what to expect.

The paddle up to the start was unremarkable, and somewhat messy. However, once we started winding up for the race I quickly found myself struggling to keep up and actually rather scared. This was partly because it was very rushed on the slide, but there was also a strong sense of fierceness and aggression during the drive, feeling rather more enthusiastic than last term's M2.

Throughout the downstream part of the race, ratio, length and timing never really came, and technique remained messy. However, the power stayed on, and every time a push was called there was a noticeable increase in boat speed.

For the upstream part of the race, I had suggested that we focus on ratio, and I feel there was a bit of improvement in this respect but not as much as might have been hoped for, and it was still difficult to get length. Commitment was still there throughout the race, but as we began to get tired our technique worsened and there were quite a few bad strokes where we lost a lot of speed.

Overall, I was pleased with this race, especially as a first outing. I felt that the level of power and aggression was very good, and we should keep that, but we need to really work on being calmer during the recovery, staying in time, and improving our technique. Our result was not too bad, though it could definitely have been better, and these points show that we have a lot of room for improvement. (Chris E.)

First outing as a crew? Felt kind of interesting to begin on a race. We started and rowed for a bit, and then we overtook someone which was fun. Then we reached the motorway bridge and some unkind person told us to spin and row it all again. This was definitely not so enjoyable; despite almost managing another overtake on the reach, our time was significantly slower. Rowing hurts. (John)