St Catharine's College Boat Club

"AAAARRRRRGGGGGHHHHHHHH" 

Rowed over.

We set out feeling fairly confident; we had been improving all week, we knew we were faster than Selwyn and we knew they had failed to gain on Christ's the day before. Not complacent about the threat they posed, we put together our race plan built around our strong cruising speed and strength in the second minute of the race.

The start was clean, probably our best, and we quickly hit the rhythm we were looking for. Going into first post corner FaT II were no where, if we'd done this yesterday we'd already have bumped them but we now had to focus on the boat ahead. Selwyn had got away quickly, clearly aware of the danger behind they were going for broke, into first post corner on station they pulled away slightly and as we turned into the gut the danger was becoming obvious to the bank party. Our push out onto the straight saw the speed pick up but there was a lot of work to do, Christ's we're being caught and we had to move. Alex called it up but there too little time left, as we headed into grassy on a tight line Selwyn began to fight for overlap. Where a poor corner for them could have let us back in they closed it up perfectly,  Christ's steered wide to avoid the incoming bow and any chance we had quickly vanished as they were hit on the exit. Steering though the clearing boats, Selwyn's jubilant shouts did little to affect our composure, rowing strongly past the plough before winding down to 30 on the reach.

M1 Rowing over past the plough

FaT II were safely behind and falling back, with no one to chase we settled into a good rhythm to make the most of what turned out to be our first training outing for HoRR. The row back was steady, mopping up the muted applause of spectators who probably didn't understand our predicament, and a wind for the finish gave the marshalling boats something to cheer for.

While it was a disappointing end to an other wise good week, we can take confidence from the fact we didn't really 'mess up'. It's easy to blame a slow Christ's crew, who had previously been overbumped in the first division, but we simply got our tactics wrong where Selwyn got their's perfectly right. Without a blistering start we built the race around our strengths and so did they, knowing they couldn't hold us off all the way they went for it and it paid off. The what ifs are endless, had we not lost our coach for the three weeks leading up to bumps things would probably have been very different; there is still an awful lot of improvement to come and we're looking forward to challenging the top boats on the river at Head of the River at the end of March.