The Club's Results

With only one practice outing on the millpond-like Cam under our belts, very little idea of what a "racing turn" involved, and a stroke-rigged boat, we weren't expecting much more than a fun day out at Itchen. The day got off to a flying (fish?) start with this race, however. We had had a lot of interest from more established coastal crews coming over to inspect our shiny new boat, ask about the Channel race, find out why we were stroke-rigged and whether we could actually row (and seeming rather sceptical about the answer). Having made their reconnaissance, they went down to the end of the course to settle their bets on whether we'd fall in or not at the buoy...

Can someone link this to the picture in the gallery of our turn? Anyway...

They can't have been very impressed with it. We lost half a length on the start by waiting for "GO" instead of starting on "attention", made up the difference to be a length up on the next crew as we reached the buoy, but went at least a length past it before even starting to turn, so lost a good deal of ground at this point. Our re-start was good despite a slight crab, and we made up the lost ground quickly enough to win reasonably comfortably by the end of the course. (Erica)

So near, and yet so far!

Our turns let us down again; faced with the memory of our rather wide turn in the heat and the knowledge that the Coalies were south coast champions and hence rather good at this buoy-turning lark, we managed to mess up rather well. Coalporters took a much sharper turn to make up the ground they lost on the first leg and put themselves a couple of lengths into the lead. Our re-start was again a definite strength, and we beasted the coastal IV down the course with lots of pushes, to finish just three feet short of the Coalporters crew on the line. A bit disappointing, and perhaps we have a moral victory for having been clearly a considerably faster crew on the straight, but in the end coastal racing does include the turn and our inexperience just counted against us.

On the bright side, the weather was wonderful, the atmosphere a lot more relaxed than at many river regattas, the coastal rowers very friendly and helpful to incompetent visitors and the coastal IV much admired. I'd definitely go back again! (Erica)