The journey to WEHORR was perhaps beset with more obstacles than usual this year. Firstly, we lost Ros Gregory to a post-BCD ankle injury, whose seat was valiantly filled by Florence Chaffey. Secondly, due to the Thames being particularly fast flowing, we weren’t sure we would be allowed to take part until the Thursday before the race. It transpired that we would be allowed to on the provision that our cox had tideway experience, which, sadly, W1’s regular cox Grace Dickinson did not have. Whilst I am confident that she could have handled the conditions we did not want to fall foul of race entry regulations, and so she gallantly stepped aside to be replaced by the heroic Tom ‘You are our only hope!’ Ash.
After a lot of frantic admin and a final outing cancelled due to fog we set off to Chiswick bright and early on Saturday morning. We arrived at Tideway Scullers School with plenty of time for re-rigging with help from the wonderful Tim Rhodes followed by a delightful pub lunch.
We set off for marshalling perhaps a little early, but this gave us time to get used to the stream, work on our onesie tans and watch about seven footballs and half a tree float past us.
Finally the race began. Our keenness to stretch out our muscles after the long wait combined with the adrenaline associated with an important race meant that we were a little rushed off the start, but Tom and our esteemed stroke Sarah Robinson managed to keep us in line. We forged ahead making substantial gains on Poplar, Blackwall & District Rowing Club by Hammersmith bridge, where we were met by cheers and shouting from a group of Sidney supporters led by the venerable Natalie Tapley. This spurred us on to overtake PBDRC soon after Hammersmith and continue on for some gusty pair pushes towards the finish line. The race ended with a mighty push to empty out, leaving us tired, sore but proud to have finished.
Our row back against the stream was long and slightly gruelling, but livened up by some imaginative pair pushes. We returned to Tideway Scullers school just as the light was beginning to fade, and the results began to come in as we were de-rigging: we had gone up from 277th place to 207th. This result bodes well for Mays next term, particularly in terms of our depth of talent as three of the women taking part were from W2. An impressive performance from all, let’s keep it up next term!
