The Club's Results

The 1st novice women were the first 1st & 3rd crew to 'race' (if thats an appropriate word?). We had decided to enter the newly chosen fixed crews into the competition, and not just the best erg times. This makes their performance even more creditable. They came 8th in their heat, with p.b's from over half the crew. A p.b by at least 2 seconds was put in by bow girl Hannah Barry, despite her falling off her seat. It was a strained heat, with new rules (that we didn't know about) put in and taken out again within about 5 mins (when the computer system worked and then broke down!).

The final was at 10.00pm, and was delayed (meaning that the beautiful and diligent women's lower boats captains had been at Queens for over 5 hours). As the standard this year was so high, we decided that our aim for the evening was to come top 5, which would mean moving up significantly from 8th. Fantastic perfomances were put in by everybody, Hannah pulled 1.53 (managing to stay on her seat this time!), Nonny pulled her first sub 1.50. Everyone gave it everything. To finish 3rd was a brilliant achievement. (Becca)

The crew displayed their confidence, if not unfailing competence, in this race. The start was superb - cruising out to a comfortable lead within the first dozen strokes. They thought better of rowing comfortably to the line, though.... much better to scare the bank party with a triple crab shipwreck for a while, letting the opposition back in to the race. No matter, they went on to win comfortably, as they knew they would. 

The bank party rather hoped that all the crabs and things had been worked out of the system for this, the 2nd race. Such dreams were quickly shattered, though, with Nonny adding a bit of drama to the plot early in the proceedings from the stroke seat. The crew knew the script and had practised this before, though, so no matter - they went on to win comfortably, as they knew they would. 

At last, a most boring race. A solid win, no drama, no fuss. Nice one. 

This time, up against the crew who went on to win, it was always going to be a tough race. The crew rose to the occasion and rowed a very good race (aside from Kim's feet suddenly popping up to head height as they came out of the shoes!), but some solid work and the day's best rowing proved no match for LMBC's blistering pace.

The ladies in red (sorry, my mistake - FaT dark blue) can expect a tougher battle in Fairbairns. 

The 1st novice women came 5th in the novice fairbairns, keeping up the good novice women's results in the club for the last 3 years. Abandoning the war paint, and unfortunatly a crew member down (note to future lower boats captains: ask all novices if they have any compulsary trips to the Tate Art Gallery on the day of novice Fairbairns before picking crews), the crew raced a good solid race. Stealing the stroke of the 2nd novice VIII (who'd already raced the course once), and putting her on bowside, they were ready to go.

Tom had the 'great' idea of going for a quick paddle before the race, pushing off 5 minutes before we were suppossed to be marshalling the marshals went crazy. After a good few minutes of '1st + 3rd what are you doing?' (classic quote of the day: Marshal to a Queens novice boat: 'Queens, what are you doing?', Queens: 'we don't know') and '1st + 3rd you'll be disquallified if you don't spin and go back NOW' (Tom: 'don't worry, keep rowing'), they came back to to the boathouse and marshalled. Going off behind LMBC they had a good start and were looking comfortable across the course. There were no major disasters in the boat. The 7 strong bankparty however had a bit of a problem with a truck blocking the whole road - meaning that the 1st VIII got a few strokes of rowing without a crazed shouting from the bank distracting them. The girls rowed a focussed and powerful race.

Despite a number of them almost throwing up on the finish line were still in good spirits and managed to sing all the way back to the boat house. They pissed off Downing the most, changing the lyrics of 'we'd rather be at Oxford than St Johns', to 'we'd rather be at Oxford than at Downing'. Loving the controversy this caused they sang other 'adapted' versions at Robinson and Jesus (after telling them that Jesus would add 10 secs to our time if they didn't stop singing they sang 'we'd rather be at Jesus than at Oxford') but manged to get back to the boat house alive.

They (and the club) should be proud of what they acheived in less than ideal circumstances yesterday. I certainly am. (Becca)