The Radford College senior boys’ quad had a great week end of racing at the Henley Royal Regatta in the UK. The crew of James Vlandis, Alex Stuchbery, Luke Letcher and Jordan Davies competed in the Fawley Cup for School and Club quad scullers under the age of 19 years. This Regatta is widely regarded as the unofficial world championships for club and school crews. The Henley Royal Regatta was first held in 1839 and has been held annually since, except during the two World Wars. It predates the Olympics and world championships and it has long been the most prestigious rowing event
The competition is a unique match racing, knock out competition between pairs of crews racing one against the other, the loser being eliminated from racing and the winner progressing to the next round. The draw is similar to that at Wimbledon, and the Royal Regatta is an enormous social event similar to the Melbourne Cup in Australia, with outrageous fashion, and spectators partying on with rowing as the backdrop. The luck of the draw can play a part in how far crews progress in the competition.
In the first round on Thursday Radford held off a very strong young crew from Marlow rowing club, who the English crowd were overwhelmingly supporting. This regatta is unique in that the spectators are very close to the crews and the support can lift crews. Marlow is a local club and the Marlow crew responded to this overwhelming roar from the crowd as the finish approached. Radford were not intimidated and held together to win by a 4 metres.
On Friday’s racing Radford raced the US Schools Champion crew from Maritime Rowing Club, Connecticut. Maritime led off the start, but Radford responded with a concerted effort over the next 500metres to take a narrow lead. In the middle stages Radford looked to be rowing better than the Americans, and slowly moving away. Over the last 600 metres the radford crew built their lead to a comfortable margin. This win by Radford, who are the Australian School Champion quad crew, against the US equivalent Champion crew is one that can be savoured by the crew and their supporters.
On Saturday morning Radford faced their toughest challenge competing against Sydney Rowing Club, made up of rowers from the best of Sydney’s GPS rowing schools and one former national junior Representative.
The Sydney crew (who averaged 90kg body weight) used their power to blast away from the much lighter Radford crew to establish a 3 length lead by half way. This very strong crew then were able to respond to the subsequent challenges that Radford put to them, to record a three and a half length win at the finish.
Subsequently Sydney Rowing Club was undefeated throughout the event to win the final by a bigger margin than they recorded against Radford.
The Radford crew can be proud of their achievement of getting through the first two rounds and then losing to the eventual winners.
Sydney Rowing Club was a class above all of the other crews competing and although Radford lost their undefeated tag for 2011, they can be proud of a very good season.
For more Information Contact
David Bagnall
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