The Club's Results
Lent Term 2016
Miscellaneous men's VIIIs
Cambridge Head-2-Head (Lents 1st Division), Performance squad crew (a)
15th/15; 7:12.6 + 8:08.3
Time: 15:20.9
Time: 15:20.9
We didn't push as much as we could. Everybody knows that. For me personally it might have been because I didn't realize how does the course of the race look like precisely so I didn't know how much of it was left. When I look back at it I think the cox also didn't stress this enough in the first race. When I heard "push harder for ten" I thought it will be about quarter of the race left but in fact it was only these ten strokes.
Things changed for me in the second race, probably because I knew the reach better. In comparison Fairbarns, the last race for me before this one, were in terms of coxing much more emotional and much more focused on the pure motivation.
Petr
Well I was pushing as hard as I could ... however given that this was my 5th and 6th 2k pieces of the day that likely isn't saying much. The only things I remember of the race are pain (lots of pain) and moving through a very dense cloud of water being constantly generated in the river frame by 7's backsplash, I call it the Michael-climate.
Cambridge Head-2-Head (Lents 1st Division), Performance squad crew (b)
14th/15; 7:07.9 + 8:05.1
Time: 15:13
Time: 15:13
The performance squad showdown got off to a bad start when the Captain transferred himself at the last minute to the A crew - mumbling something about "fairness" and "the B crew is stacked" - and allocated himself the cream of the club's equipment, leaving us to row in a boat older than some freshers, and with blades bendier than a deep squat with insufficient core on the way up.
I was apprehensive: a completely scratch crew, comprising considerable brawn, was going to be unpleasant if we rowed badly and exhausting if we rowed at all well. We chose the latter, attacking the first half of the first piece hard.
We were rewarded with a remarkably level boat around Ditton, as the powerful dips down to strokeside balanced the dizzying centrifugal force of Juliet's tight steering. Grassy was therefore less successful, but we finished the piece in style, winding to 34 in a light tailwind.
By the second piece I'd finished remembering how to row strokeside, and could concentrate on more advanced points of finesse such as actually putting the blade in the water. This piece was more technically refined, but seemed slower, which was confirmed by the times: I suspect this was due to the headwind, getting cold, and committing well to the first piece.
Overall, a fun day out, beating the A crew and not far off the provisional M2.
I was apprehensive: a completely scratch crew, comprising considerable brawn, was going to be unpleasant if we rowed badly and exhausting if we rowed at all well. We chose the latter, attacking the first half of the first piece hard.
We were rewarded with a remarkably level boat around Ditton, as the powerful dips down to strokeside balanced the dizzying centrifugal force of Juliet's tight steering. Grassy was therefore less successful, but we finished the piece in style, winding to 34 in a light tailwind.
By the second piece I'd finished remembering how to row strokeside, and could concentrate on more advanced points of finesse such as actually putting the blade in the water. This piece was more technically refined, but seemed slower, which was confirmed by the times: I suspect this was due to the headwind, getting cold, and committing well to the first piece.
Overall, a fun day out, beating the A crew and not far off the provisional M2.
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Full Miscellaneous men's VIIIs results archive
