Rowing Ahead
RGS Rowers competed in three days of racing at the National Schools Regatta.
The Year Ten Rowers raced hard in their first time trials. The 1st J15 Open Coxed Quadruple finished 33rd place in the time trial and the 1st J15 Girls Coxed Quadruple Scull achieved 26th place in the time trial. The 2nd J15 Open Quadruple Scull achieved a C final and won this convincingly.
On Saturday 27 May the Senior Rowers arrived at Dorney Lake and started their campaign. For championship crews Saturday was made up of time trials or heats followed by repechages and the Sunday was semi-finals and finals. The non-championship events raced over one day with a time trial and a final.
The first time trial was the Open 2nd Quad Scull of James Robinson, Charlie White, Joshua Marks and Thomas Cartwright. They achieved 15th place qualifying for a C final. In the C final the crew achieved 3rd.
The Championship Girls Quad of Esther Clayton, Poppy Pinfield, Charlotte Griffiths and Jasmine Day were drawn straight into a heat and sculled into 8th place in the race. In the repechage they improved their rhythm and steering which improved their time. On Sunday the girls upped their game again drawing ever closer to their opposition and were placed 7th in the semi and 6th in the D final.
Menna Sutton raced the Championship Girls Single Scull. In the time trial Menna achieved 19th place out of 49. This qualified Menna for the repechage. In the repechage Menna came 3rd qualifying for a C/D semi-final. In the C/D semi on Sunday Menna comfortably qualified for the C final. In the C final Menna executed the race plan perfectly and achieved 4th.
In the hotly contested Championship Quad the Boys Quad of Matthew Smith, Benjamin Koutrouki, Tobey Butler and Harry Rutter raced their time trial and achieved 29th place. In the repechage, the RGS Worcester quad was drawn in the same race as the King’s School Worcester Quad. The race was a battle from the word go. After a brilliant race the RGS crew finished behind the King’s School crew by less then a second. In the C/D semi the RGS crew were the fastest qualifiers for the D final with King’s second in qualifying for the D final. In the race that really mattered, in the final, the RGS crew raced down the lake neck and neck with King’s School and then in the closing stages powered away to victory.
To round off the RGS Worcester entry, Lucy Whiteley and Olivia Hodgson joined the team for Sunday’s racing. The Girls J16 2x had a time trial to rank the crews followed by a final. The girls came 6th out of 34 in the time trial which placed them into the A final. In the A final the girls achieved an extraordinary 5th place pushing back at their opposition for the whole race.
Worcester Regatta
On Saturday 20 May the Rowers had another successful Regatta racing over 800m on the River Severn.
RGS Worcester entered 20 crews, coming away with 4 event wins, 4 second places and a number of semi finals. A special mention must go to the outstanding display of sculling from James Ford and Will Cartwright who raced in the final of the Junior 15 Double Scull. They sculled brilliantly, unfortunately losing by just 3 feet. In addition, the Year Nine rowers raced and continued to develop their racing experience holding their own against some strong opposition.
The winners were:
- Open Junior 18 Coxless Quad of Matthew Smith, Benjamin Koutrouki, Tobey Butler and Harry Rutter
- Menna Sutton Women’s Junior 18 Single Scull
- Lucy Whiteley Women’s Junior 16 Single Scull
- Menna Sutton and Lucy Whiteley Women’s Junior 18 Double Scull.
Well done to all of our rowers who were racing at local and national levels. It is great to see the development in RGS Rowing this summer season.
