The Club's Results

We weren't expecting a great deal from our trip to BUSA given that we'd had approximately one and a half outings together as a crew, never done more than a burst and certainly nothing as ambitious as a 2k piece rating 34ish. Ho hum.

Once we'd been told, as we were boating, that Honey needed to have a weigh in certificate (the officials were most amused) and rowed up to the start all that remained was to not embarrass ourselves either by a) failing to attach to the stakeboat or b) finishing the race after everyone else had already deboated. We accomplished a) pretty quickly and efficiently and with 3 and 5 manfully sculling 2 and 4's blades at firm pressure to keep us straight we waited for the other crews to attach. Pleasingly, the Oxford lightweights were the slowest of the lot. Finally, with the green light (and apparently a klaxon too - that didn't make it to the bows in the roaring headwind) we were off.

Somehow, our start was better than everyone elses, but lack of crew togetherness/fitness/having trained told slightly in the first minute and Oxford stormed off into the distance to win the heat by a convincing 20 seconds. However, of the remaining 4 crews we were comfortably the fastest and coped well with the incredibly windy conditions to open out a lead of around a length and a half, which we kept until the finish, earning us a place in the repechage. A great result, which rather unfortunately meant we had to do it all again... :) (Amelia)

Someone needs to learn to spell repechage.... (RTT)

Between races we obtained a copy of the results (20p well spent) and found that of the crews in the repechage (2nd and 3rd place from each of three heats) we'd got the fastest time by quite way. Given that conditions had remained steadily awful and therefore times could be compared, this should mean that we were well placed to take one of the final slots by coming in the top 3 in the repechage.

The wind had died down a bit by the time we came to race but it was still pretty unpleasant. We rowed a little better and rather more consistently. Unfortunately the crews directly on either side of us were very slow, although Durham and Nottingham had a bit of a tussle and remained fairly level with us. We crossed the line a very close 2nd, less than a second behind the Nottingham crew. Next stop, the final! (Amelia)

By this point in the day we were getting pretty tired out, not having anticipated doing 3 2k pieces! Lining up in the final with two Oxford crews, the CUW lightweights, Nottingham and Durham, we expected the race to be divided into two separate contests; one for the medals between Oxford, Oxford and Cambridge, with the remaining three of us fighting it out for 4th, 5th and 6th. This was exactly as it turned out - the university crews shot off into the sunset leaving us trailing in their wake as we struggled with the wind which was picking up and swirling all over the place. We were fairly level with Durham for much of the race but they gradually opened up a small lead which we couldn't match, eventually crossing the line about a length ahead. Slightly disappointing given that we'd beaten them in the two previous rounds, but 5th in the final is still a lot better than the embarrassment of being knocked out in the heats which we'd expected given our lack of experience both rowing as a crew and racing in a 2k multilane regatta. Hopefully we'll do one (well, two) better next time! (Amelia)