A solid weekend of racing saw our Junior crews all move on in their racing experience for their final main Regatta of 2022, the British Junior Championships.
All our medals were won over 2,000m
Ella and Emily, racing in the WJ18 Championship Pairs A Final, set off in an uncertain tussle with rivals from Newark RC. It took until 750m out before they took the lead as per their race plan before storming out to a decisive victory by 7.8 seconds to win Gold.
Byron was racing above his age group in the J18 Championship singles A Final. At 250m he was in last place but he didn’t panic. He kept to his race plan working his way past the other competitors one by one, never falling below rate 36, to emerge in the lead for the last quarter of the 2,000m course and clinch a second Gold medal for the Club by over 5 seconds.
Cory and Joe made it into the J16 Pairs A Final and deservedly made the podium with the Bronze medal after a long season of Final B wins and “nearly” results as they have built up their sweep rowing technique. Their businesslike first 500m put them in the lead, forcing the following crews to work hard for their medals.
All our other crews made significant race result improvements over their earlier season fortunes. Being in minor finals always requires fully committed racing to hold or improve your time trial ranking.
Dan made it into the B Final of the J15 Single. A good aggressive technique off the start kept him competitive, enabling a finishing position one place higher than predicted from the time trial. He was 10th out of 35 entries.
Seren raced in the WJ15 Singles. After posting an excellent 8th place in the time trial, she crabbed on the buoy line after the start of the B Final, which cost a length or more. This proved too big a job to recover in the second half of the race despite her blistering burn which closed up strongly on the field ahead. She finished 10th out of 29 entries.
James and Alex raced in the J18 Championship Pairs where they won the B Final. They were 7th out of 14 entries.
Daniel raced in the J18 Singles and got to the E final. He delivered a well-executed race, holding the head of the pack from the outset as per his plan, until the final 500m when the heavier sculler from Gloucester Hartbury turned on some hidden power to take the lead. He was 26th out of 40 entries
Lyla, Seren, Emily and Aditi raced in the WJ16 coxless Quad Sculls. They smashed their way into the B Final via the time trial with a great step up in confident racing. They finished 11th out of 16 entries.
Emily raced in the WJ16 Single Sculls getting to the B Final. She had a hard tussle with the Bewl Bridge and Tyne scullers for mid-field placings achieving 10th place out of 23 entries.
It was a great weekend of racing for all our Junior’s and bodes well for next season.
