Henley Women’s Regatta went into the books with another marathon day of racing – although the four-minute centers of Friday and Saturday gave way to five-minute centers for the finals, and there was even a half hour break today.
In the Elite eights, as in many other events, semis were held in the morning, and finals in the afternoon–-Sprints anyone? In the first semi, Brown shadowed the British U23 crew down the course, but fell by 1.5 lengths. In the second semi, Princeton fell to a composite crew understood to be the “European Championships” eight, but no one seems to have the slightest idea what that means. Rumors have had it on one hand as a crew composed of British university students from multiple countries, and on the other hand as a “pre-elite” crew of English athletes too old to make the U23 eight, but put together and given direction in anticipation of the “massive hemorrhaging of athletes” anticipated by GB rowing after the London Olympics. Unable to find a definitive answer, I felt I had failed my duty as an, ahem, journalist, but to tell the truth no one I asked knew--or in some cases, I suspect, were perhaps simply unwilling to share any information. The crew is tall and strong, and rows very well in demanding conditions, so should have a nice go at the HRR should they attend. They followed up on the win over Princeton by downing the GB U23 eight in the final, so very much the class of the Women's Henley.
In any case, during that semi race with the Tigers, the composite crew surrendered just over a length to Princeton in the first 700-800 meters of the racecourse but, aided a bit by the wind shadow in what is apparently called “the brush trees wind” coming off the Bucks shore, drew even with 500 to go and, in the quickening headwind down the stretch, Princeton had no answer for the squad’s pre-elite fitness and power. The Princeton crew is racing intact from the collegiate season save for their stroke seat, who is now training with the Canadian team and was not released to race at Henley.
The Peabody Cup for junior eights has been officially and very appropriately named in memory of Hart Perry, and it seemed fitting to have an all-American junior final, in which Groton pulled away early from a game St Paul’s crew to take the trophy. Earlier in the day, Groton was worried about a semifinal with a touted JEH crew, but blasted off the start and kept going to get a big enough lead that JEH never had a chance to mount the expected mid-race challenge in the wind shadow section of the course.
The varsity women’s eight from Purdue looked primed to take home a trophy, but fell to a seasoned Dutch crew from ASR Nereus who probably have as many years in boats in their stern four as Purdue has in their entire crew. The Purdue crew put on a good show on the weekend, though, including a quarter-length win in their morning semi (which one surmises they may have been feeling in the final a few hours later), representing themselves very well. The winning Nereus crew-–well, all the winning Nereus crews, of which there were three on the day--sang their club song on the medal stand, and sang it well, actually; it is always good to see folks enjoying themselves on the medal stand.
When presenting the winner of The Groton School Challenge Cup for junior fours, the announcer noted that “the trophy will be going home this year” as the crew from Merion Mercy, who also won a raft of races back in the States, beat the Tideway Scullers by fully five lengths in the final. The Merion Mercy kids had some fetching gear for the medals show; well played.
While the sheer number of crews and events forces us to focus mostly on American crews for purposes of this write-up, but I would like to mention that it is always great to see a crew from the local Henley Rowing Club win on their home course, as did the Henley RC in the Junior 16 4x today. The celebration put on by a Henley men’s eight after winning an event at HRR a couple years ago was as ebullient and honest as any I have ever seen.
Unusual sponsor of the year so far: gavinismydentist.com sponsored the shell named Smile Like You Mean It, complete with a smiley icon.
The HWR takes a big swing in trying to do a whole lot in three days, and is impressive as such; certainly it balances the HRR’s sparse and very exclusive women’s entries. This is not to say it doesn’t throw a few googly’s here and there: many aspects of the regatta look a lot like HRR, and then others a bit like a local weekend regatta. For a positive example, the concentration of activity is great--the picnic tables at the Barn Bar just above the regatta area make for a very comfortable setting, with none of the chav-like messiness the Barn Bar will host a couple weeks from now. Overall, this mix can sometimes tip in your favor, and sometimes not; crews visiting the regatta would do well to embrace and prepare for both aspects of the regatta.
Finally, in his words to close the regatta, Lord Colin Moynihan thanked a number of people, including the overseas crews for coming, noting that “the premier American collegiate rowing Web site is covering this regatta, which speaks to the level the regatta has attained.” Glad to have you as a reader, Lord Moynihan!
Comments | Log in to comment |
There are no Comments yet
|