St Catharine's College Boat Club

Bumped Selwyn II

We knew that Selwyn II were a decent crew, and that they would do everything they could to hit Clare II before we could get to them, so we had a slight change of plan today: to go hard off the start and try to gain on Selwyn quickly before they could ruin our chances of a bump.

All the excitement got to us a little, and my massive air stroke on the second draw stroke illustrated nicely the tension in the boat going up First Post Reach. All in all the rowing was pretty good though and we held a lively 38 on the rating until the Gut. This all out attack was working - we were making good ground on Selwyn II. There was only so long we could hold this rate for though and soon we had to let it drop. Fortunately this wasn't too much of a problem as Selwyn weren't making any ground on Clare, so we began to relax and the rowing got tidier.

A great line from Alistair around Grassy brought us even closer and soon we were getting the whistles for half a length then a canvas along Plough Reach. Around Ditton corner Alistair made one of those brilliant coxing decisions that we never want him to make again, and steered for the bump with about a foot of overlap. Fortunately we made contact and got the bump.

Today certainly wasn't our tidiest rowing, but clearly it was pretty fast, since we hit the relativley quick Selwyn II relatively quickly. Even the hard to impress Dr Wothers seemed happy with our performance today, so it must have been ok!

Tomorrow sees us chasing Clare II, themselves chasing Corpus Christi at the top of the division.