On Saturday, the Oundle Boat Club took two crews to the Peterborough Junior Championships at the Peterborough City Rowing Club for their first and only regatta, overcoming a challenging training season to debut impressive performances on the water.
Although the crews had had a good run of training, two nights before the regatta, the girls crew faced having to drop out when one member had to go into isolation. To stay in the competition, the risky decision was taken to move the cox to number 2, where she would row for the first time in two years, and bring in a new cox who they had never trained with.
Their first time trial race on the water in the W J15 coxed quad suffered mistakes due to the crew’s inexperience working together and understanding how to pace under pressure. Nevertheless, their result out of 20 schools placed them in the Plate A Final. They regrouped after a crew talk with their coaches, and finished their second race with better pacing and no mistakes. They narrowly lost gold by four seconds to Sir William Perkins, and placed 2nd ahead of Bedford Girls’ School and Kingston Grammar School.
The boys crew also participated in their first race of the season. Their Op J14 coxed quad started off with a good time trial round and finished with a very credible 9th place out of 17 crews, which placed them in the C Final. They then had an even better row and managed to overhaul crews from Bedford School and Norwich School, finishing 2nd just behind Kingston Grammar School.
