St Catharine's College Boat Club

M3 set out on Thursday to right Wednesday’s wrongs.  Drawing inspiration from a variety of sources, including Hunter’s future children, Tom Nixon’s legacy and Rocky Balboa, we set out from our boathouse as the underdog.  After Hunter’s promise to name one of the aforementioned future kids after one of us should we bump, we were raring to go.  Things did not go entirely to plan.  The pursuing Downing M3 was (and, at the time of writing, still is) a very good crew.  At certain points, it felt as if we could pull away from them, but it was not to be, and we were bumped fairly quickly.  Again, there were many positives to take out of the race.  Our start sequence was solid, we showed that we could push ourselves deeper, and there will not be a Jeroen Sims running around southern Indiana.  We were simply beaten by a better crew.

- Tom Cleere

With a solid race plan in place, Catz W2 set off confident to catch Eddies’ this time, hoping not to have to do a painful rowover again.

Whilst Mother Nature spared us the torrential rain, she decided to give us some wind to battle through instead. Despite strong winds funneling through the motorway bridge, W2 set off to a solid start, reaching a phenomenal rate 39, which left us with our first whistle from Eddies. On the other end, Emma was also gaining on us, with their very ambitious first whistle being blown as we were taking our first corner.

Unfortunately, chaos started after the 3rd minute in as Crews ahead failed to clear the river in time, forcing all crews to hold it up, a situation division 3 is familiar with. Fortunately this time, Catz W2 did not mount Eddies’ boat, and we were left with a technical row over. We had a solid row back, disappointed not to have caught Eddies’, but glad not to have had to rerow the whole course. Third try is our lucky one, hopefully we’ll be able to implement our race plan this time round!

- Astrid de Boysson

Having been bumped by a rapid Magdalene M2 on the first day, Catz M2 were keen to get back into our stride, chasing Magdalene and with Trinity Hall racing behind us. We started on station six, right next to the bridge, cannon and outflow. We pushed off twenty seconds before the start cannon, and were unlucky to have our bows caught by the outflow, causing Stephen to drop the bung. Despite the mishap we got off to an excellent start, with a solid rhythm call.

Coming up to first post corner, we passed three boats pulled into the towpath: Magdalene had been at canvas with Robinson as they had bumped Christ's, so they were awarded a technical row over. Our crew sped past, realising that neither a bump or an overbump were any longer on the cards, and with Trinity hall on station behind us. As we came up to Ditton, their bank party began making very optimistic whistles they made a push and closed the gap to just under a length, but as we entered the reach, we began to pull away, taking back two lengths by the time Trinity Hall began to wind down by the marshalling zone.

Catz M2 produced a quality row over and we're raring to go for tomorrow!

- David Evans

W1 hoped that the campaign to catch Homerton today might be a fairly short and sweet affair as Peterhouse (who we had bumped yesterday) had been closing on Homerton before we caught them at first post corner.

After a fairly speedy start, we were roughly on station both in front and behind but closed to a length on Homerton by around the motorway bridge. Unfortunately it wouldn't be the quick bump we'd hoped for as Homerton seemed to have found some extra pace from yesterday and held us around a length for most of first post reach. Peterhouse had gone off hard and closed to around a length on us coming into first post corner, but they then fell away and didn't worry us for the rest of the race.

The adrenaline was surging as we had settled to a not-very-sustainable 35spm, so although we gained gradually on Homerton, it came in fits and starts. A big four out of first post corner briefly settled the rhythm and we were rewarded with two whistles and "great move!" from Rory on the bank. We were around canvas going into grassy but, again, it got a bit untidy and rumour has it that three whistles became two. But a big four out of the corner brought us back together and our fleeting moments of composure were enough to take us to canvas by the end of plough reach. On overlap all the way around Ditton, Homerton went wide and we took the racing line, sealing the deal in traditional fashion as we pulled out onto the reach - almost perfectly in time with Queens' catching Peterhouse behind us. Not the prettiest rowing but it got the job done!

Rounding Grassy