Henley Royal Regatta


Photos 37 - 54 out of 88 | Back to Albums
And we get off pretty well - rating up to 48 strokes per minute for the first 30 odd strokes. London are in our sights for the first 300m or so, but after that we were never really in the race. They get ahead from the Temple Island marker and from the stroke seat I never see them again... This is probably my favourite photo of all the ones I've seen of our race. You can clearly see everyone's faces, and the blade work isn't too shabby. Notice our nice shiny painted oar blades :) Unfortunately our race as a whole is not as good as we would have liked. Our qualifier row was considerably better - much more solid and powerful. It's the sign of a crew that needs a bit more race experience, since it is obvious that the nerves of going head to head with another crew got to many of us. Experience and more racing in future will fix this.
Some more racing photos. Tuyut in the prime location to shout orders at me. Sheer power being laid down by the boys in the bow, doing their best to lift the boat nose out of the water with every stroke so that the middle 4 - the engine room - can plow us on with their monstrous strokes. (About time you started pulling your weight Lovejoy!) The middle four powerhouse of our boat! Oli the efficient German, Ants, who kind of took my spot in the middle when they moved me to stroke. Big Dave - the second biggest person in the entire regatta (according to the competitor weights recorded in the programme!) and Paulie at 6 seat, who after 3 years has finally made it into the top crew of the club after knocking on the door for so long.
As we cross the finish line, the official verdict is 'London RC A beat Putney Town RC by approx 4 lengths.' This isn't too bad - closer would have been nicer, but in the end, anything over 5 lengths difference and the verdict is considered 'beaten easily'. We come into land, a little deflated as you always are after any race where you lose. But still happy that we got the opportunity to race at all. There is one good thing to come out of the loss: it's now beer o'clock... We pack up and load the boat before we hit the cans, getting it out of the way. And grab a bit of a group photo while we're at it!
And another official crew photo - now freshly showered and all blazered up ready to hit the barn bar and sink some piss, we all look mighty dapper in our club blazers! It's absolutely stinking hot however (around 30 deg) and the blazers won't last all day, despite how good they look. The showers being extremely cold (not hot water at all!) were at least good for cooling us down well after our race. Tuyut all frocked up! She's looking forward to a beer just as much as the boys. It's tough work being the cox ;) The Barn Bar - drinking hole for all the rowers who suffer an early demise, and don't have a badge to get into the Stewards Enclosure We get a pretty good look at the start line from down here, and this is where all the good live music and partying will be later on at night! And where all the tottie will be going to pick up rowers in blazers...
Paulie and I enjoy our first beer at the Barn Bar. It tastes so bloody good, goes down like water. And inside the Barn Bar - well it looks like a barn actually! Let me introduce Hung Moose. Hung accompanied me out to Henley for a drink, and he shouted me a Pimms (a very expensive Pimms mind you, at nearly 9 quid a cup!) Sniff, you'd like Hung, he's a roosters supporter!
Mate, look at this guy. EGL. How can the ladies resist? Exactly, they cannot! Extremely good looking. I love my blazer :) Hung Moose attacks Phil! Ahh Oli - German drinking machine. Very efficient too. I'm hitting up Oktoberfest with Oli in September :)
   
Photos 37 - 54 out of 88 | Back to Albums
Description: To win the Henley Royal Regatta is possibly the stuff that dreams are made of, up there with winning a Gold Medal in the Olympics. And you can imagine that even to be able to compete at such a prestigious event is such a great feat in itself. In 2009, I had the opportunity to be coached by one of the UK's double Olympic gold medal winning rowers, Andy Holmes. After a long, cold winter of technical rowing, and months of torturous ergo sessions to become more physically fit than I've ever been before in my life, I was promoted to the position of stroke of the Putney Town Rowing Club senior men's 8+ crew! Taking this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity by the balls, we marched on to the Henley qualifiers to fight for one of 32 positions in the Thames Cup event... and we did it!
Location: England

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