The Club's Results

We went into this race intending to row the full distance, and possibly bumping anything that came our way in the latter part of the race. On the first start, we settled in more quickly than yesterday, as per the plan. Out of First Post, Fitz had made up a whole length before the race was stopped at the same point as yesterday owing to more carnage.

On the re-row, our start was better and we denied Fitz the second whistle for much longer. However on the Reach it started coming apart and soon Fitz even had overlap. At this point, Gurpreet's evasive maneuvers and aggressive line through the bend under the Railway Bridge kept them at bay, and encouragement from our W1 (and from seeing that Maggie M3 were bumped) gave us just enough strength to get us home and (not so) dry.

Going into the race, we were hoping we could hold off Fitz and use them to push us into Clare Hall. However, the entire day was against us, from the weather, our stroke hurting his arm in the Stomp and our three being on such a tight schedule that he jumped straight into the boat at the marshalling zone. The paddle-up was rocky but the practice start was very good.

At the start, we quickly gained a whistle on Clare Hall, but unlike the first race kept our cool and played the long game. We were slightly surprised when we reached Grassy without the entire race being stopped, although perhaps we would have rather that happened. By this point Fitz were around 3/4 of a length behind and our technique fell apart dramatically. Airstrokes and near-crabs all down the boat meant Fitz bumped us at the end of Plough Reach.

With Queens M3 behind, we were confident we could row over, but the fact that M3 headship was at stake was in the forefront of our minds. Although the sun decided to come out today, the river level was well over the bank height at the boathouse and the current was extremely strong.

We got off to a strong start, then our prayers were answered as Queens suffered a crab that they failed to totally recover from, meaning they were bumped by Jesus M3 well before First Post. All we had to do now was fend off Lady Margaret. We pulled away from them in the Gut, but despite Gurpreet's skills with the rudder, the current pushed us very wide around Grassy and strokeside almost had to stop rowing altogether. But the worst was yet to come. On the Reach, the combination of current and headwind made it feel like we were rowing through treacle. Lady Margaret started gaining on us and worrying our bank party, but thankfully we didn't feed them enough breakfast at Stomp for them to come too close to us and M3 headship survives another year.

Although we may not have performed as well as we may have hoped at the start of the term (something something blades, Luke?), we gained some important racing experience and hopefully we can all win our first bump come Mays!

After Bumps, one of our regulars injured himself and another decided to gain early immunity to COVID-19 by letting himself get infected. This left two bowsider-shaped holes in our lineup which were duly filled by two strokesiders in the form of Leszek and Ziqi. As a result, our regular Two (who is slightly bisweptual) and our Four (who can't actually row strokeside and decided to see if he can row bowside) moved forward one seat. The conditions were similarly bad to Pembroke but the majority of the racing crews turned up.

At the start, Christ's gained quickly as many air-strokes were taken by our Four-turned-Five who now identifies as "asweptual". However a huge crab from Christ's slowed them massively, and pushed them into us causing a blade clash. From then on, it was a close fight with our boat having considerably more power but rarely being together. We were a a good half a length ahead at the Railway Bridge before Christ's gained quickly, and the finish line couldn't have come sooner.

Off the line, some of our crew decided air was a better medium to put power down in than water, others decided to try keeping the blade feathered all the time and our Four-turned-Five decided no power was necessary at all until the twelfth stroke. Magdalene were a strong crew and they were quickly gone, and unfortunately stayed gone for the rest of the race. Thankfully they won the finals, and most of our crew belive we would have beat Kings so we claim 2nd place in spirit.

A massive thanks to Leszek and Ziqi for subbing in at very short notice and saving us from having to scratch, and of course thanks to the numerous First and Third members who volunteered as umpires, marshals and other roles, without whom there wouldn't have been a race at all.