The Club's Results

I was expecting this to be the hardest race of the competition apart from potentially the FF final. It seems I was very wrong. Quite apart from attempts to guess differences between the respective members of the crews, I would guess having a crew with similar power is pretty useful. Well, that and Ro is phenomenal.
I was a bit worried 600m in that my technique/lungs weren't going to cope with the reasonably aggressive rate (compared to my sculling career), but shortly after that Emma's calls made it clear that as long as I kept the boat between the banks we would have the race. We hit their wash outside the plough, kept the inside line round Ditton, and then sat alongside them for a while down the reach, occasionally overlapping blades as they drifted back towards us. With 200m to go to our finish and a call of "Let's go" we pushed a bit and went a few lengths clear. We then easied, realised they were going to run into us, so paddled off in front of them again to let them finish.

After the race I realised I should have stayed at full pressure, as I won't much fancy going for a time on Wednesday morning if I have a FF final to follow. However, we might well go faster for less effort in future by the useful measure of me rowing in time. I enjoyed a lot sculling well, if I can get my bladework that sorted in a single it might actually be an enjoyable way to train. (Peter)

First race without the rudder, we very nearly took out the outside of grassy, which would have made the race slightly more interesting. Ro claimed this was because she wasn't concentrating, Mark Beer claimed the fin was probably bent, a view I came to agree with when I realised we couldn't get down Plough Reach on the paddle back in a straight line. Sculling was nothing special compared to the good bits on Monday. (Peter)

With Chris (and Alexis) having just got within 5s of Nash and friend, it seemed likely any chance of this being a close race had disappeared. With the fin straightened up a bit, we made it round Grassy slightly better, but strokeside corners were still very easy; that could just be our sculling tho. I'm not quite sure whether I think a rudder is better or worse for racing on-Cam; probably it is unless you've practised and got the hang of cornering hard with the blades.

I'm still quite surprised by the lack of speed of this competition; I've rowed in a couple of mixed doubles before, with girls probably 50s of erg slower than Ro, and I'd have expected them to be able to get inside 7:54. Can I get any Trinity girls pre-emptively keen for next year if there aren't any Bradburys entered? (Peter)

We were quicker on the straights, they were more quicker on the corners. (Tom C)

With both members of the crew now having recorded impressive sculling results this term, I feel it reasonable to add my perspective on this; a substantial underperformance by Tom and Flo.

I turned up at the lock a few minutes before their start because it sounded like it might be a race worth watching, and offered to bankparty them if they wanted one. Unfortunately, it seemed Flo took that to mean that I'd treat them as a radio-controlled double... Tom O'Neill might have just about been an accurate enough banksteerer, but I certainly wasn't up to controlling Flo's unexpected veering.
I can't remember the distances now, but Tom and Flo on bottom station had closed quite a lot by First post, where the meandering started. On Grassy I looked down at my watch for a moment to take a split to the Jesus double, and when I looked up Flo was steering dramatically towards the outside of Grassy. After the uninspiring set of calls: "Away hard! Harder! No, really, more harder!" and 5 strokes of ghost pressure on strokeside they got the boat pointing along the river again, but the damage had been done. 10-15s had probably been chucked on the first two corners, and Jesus were ahead. Mark Beer said he thought Jesus were 2s up at the bottom of the reach, and they'd probably practised a bit; their wind to the finish was at least as effective as Tom and Flo's, and considerably higher rating, and they held their minimum winning margin.

Jesus went on to push Nash and friend quite close in the final, so it was a great pity some reasonably good looking sculling wasn't rewarded with a potential SBR (and Michell cup) win. Apologies for being entirely surprised by and unprepared for the demands placed upon me! (Peter)