| St Catherine's College Rowing Society | 
|
|
President: Colin Smith Vice Presidents: Don Barton, Neil Chugani, Richard Peters, Sir Matthew Pinsent CBE, Ben Sylvester, Zoe de Toledo, Andrew Triggs Hodge OBE. |
|
| St Catherine's College Rowing Society |
|
|
President: Colin Smith Vice Presidents: Don Barton, Neil Chugani, Richard Peters, Sir Matthew Pinsent CBE, Ben Sylvester, Zoe de Toledo, Andrew Triggs Hodge OBE. |
![[Prev]](../../gif/larrow.gif)
| Newsletter#1, Trinity Term, 2019 (18th May) |
![[Next]](../../gif/rarrow.gif)
|
[PDF version] |
Contents |
Links |
|
After last year's clean sweep by Cambridge in the Boat Races,
Oxford may have started to
turn things around this year with victories for both lightweight crews, while
the other four boats at least managed to reduce Cambridge's winning margins.
The only Catz student taking part was Augustin Wambersie who, as stroke,
led OUBC in a remarkable fight-back over the second half of their race
but ultimately ran out of river.
Former Catz student Ante Kusurin (M.06) had better fortune in the Veterans' Boat Race. Having flown over from the US just for the event, he was parachuted (probably metaphorically) into the stroke seat of the winning Oxford crew. Three of our VPs (Pinsent, de Toledo, Triggs Hodge) also featured in the TV coverage in various capacities. Just before Easter, a large Catz Boat Club contingent flew off to Milan for a training camp in the Italian lakes (supported by the Rowing Society). We have a report — although I suspect a carefully redacted version rather than the full Così fan Tutti. And finally we have the prospects for Eights (29th May – 1st June). |
|
|
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
The first of three successive boat race weekends started with the men's
lightweights racing, for the first time, over the Tideway course
(sensibly combined with a number of
other Oxford and Cambridge private fixtures on the same afternoon).
Oxford were firm favourites, with 5 returning Blues to Cambridge's none,
but nevertheless it was Cambridge, on the Middlesex station, who took the
early lead and held it all the way to Hammersmith Bridge. But finally
their bubble burst and Oxford's class took them through for what was,
eventually, a comfortable victory. At which point
all dark blue supporters heaved a sigh of relief knowing that this
year was going to be better than last year.
Then, on to Henley; until recently venue for 4 of the 6 Boat Races but now just hosting the women's lightweights race (along with the intercollegiate and alumnae races). With little form to go on, and three of the previous four races having been decided by less than half a length, this really was anyone's guess. Watching the video, I'd have said that Cambridge looked the better crew, yet Oxford powered away to win by a surprisingly large margin of 2½ lengths. Cambridge won all the other races on the programme, but obviously we don't count those. And finally, the Boat Race weekend. Since moving to the Tideway the Women's Boat Race has lacked a certain ... suspense? The favourite — and there has always been a clear favourite — just takes the lead off the start and continues to row away. Same again this year, although Cambridge's winning margin of only 5 lengths made it the closest race so far. |
The men's race was more intriguing. Cambridge were firm favourites,
and duly took the lead despite Oxford having the advantage of the Fulham bend.
But then, inexplicably, the Cambridge cox decided to risk it all by
venturing into Oxford's water and causing a blade
clash — had Oxford suffered serious equipment damage
it would have meant
disqualification, and had Cambridge suffered damage it would have been regarded
as self-inflicted.
But they got away with it and extended their lead around the
Hammersmith bend to two lengths. Race over? Oxford thought differently
and began to close the gap. A visibly
tiring Cambridge were mightily relieved to cross the finish line, with
Oxford snapping at their heels.
|
|
Clare Leckie, Women's Co-Captain
Over the Easter break, 26 athletes (11 women and 15 men) and 3 coaches travelled to northern Italy for a week-long training camp on Lake Monate. Rowing with snow-capped peaks in the distance, this was an idyllic location to get a head start on our Summer VIIIs training. We were hosted by a local club ASD Canottieri Monate, and for most of our sessions we had the lake entirely to ourselves! With access to two eights, a coxless four and a coxless quad, everyone was involved in two sessions on the water each day. Although most of these sessions were organised so that the men's and women's squads could train independently, we all came together at meal times and for muscle-activation, cool-downs, team bonding activities and workshops. For a number of our athletes, this was their first time rowing off the Isis. Many also had the opportunity to row in coxless boats for the first time, and some got the chance to try coxing. All in all, it was a wonderful week full of training, learning and team-bonding for everyone involved. |
Big thank-yous to Giovanna Granata for her incredible translation, Rowan Nicholls and David Zimmer for their excellent coaching, and Alex Bowmer for his indispensable physiotherapy and his amazing nutrition and injury prevention/treatment workshops. |
|
Returning from Italy there was barely time to unpack for an Easter weekend at
home before coming up to Oxford for the start of term.
Our men's 1st VIII is largely unchanged from Torpids (unfortunately our Blue, Augustin Wambersie, is unavailable for Eights). They're currently experimenting with a tandem rig — these suddenly seem quite fashionable, possibly inspired by Cambridge's Boat Race success, but they make racking boats in the confined, interlocking spaces within a college boathouse a bit of a nightmare. They raced at Bedford Regatta last Saturday (albeit briefly).
|
The women, on the other hand, have had to accommodate their two returning squad triallists, which has had the knock-on effect that two members of the 1st Torpid are now in the 2nd Eight (as G.T.C. II will not have appreciated when they took on Catz II for some bumping practice this afternoon). The women are focussing solely on Eights this term, with no plans to race anywhere else. |
|
Eights start on Wednesday, 29th May and continue until Saturday, 1st June. We have three crews in the fixed divisions. The women's 2nd VIII and a yet-to-materialise men's 3rd VIII (I believe David Zimmer is working on it) will have to qualify in Rowing On next Saturday. Back in 2012 it was decided to expand Eights divisions from 12 to 13 boats, creating an extra 13 places. However, the number of entries received remained about the same, with the unintended consequence that Rowing On for Eights has generally been a bit of a formality for any crew capable of cohesive rowing. Racing on Wed–Fri starts at noon and finishes at 6.45pm, while on Saturday everything is, as usual, one hour earlier (Eights dinners to get to!).
|
The men's 1st Eight
start behind Trinity, who had a good Torpids and, in theory, now have
the services of a Blue, an Isis and a lightweight to call upon. Ahead
of them are S.E.H., who are probably salivating over the prospect of
Univ. for breakfast. Behind Catz are Jesus, whose steady rise since 2015 came
to an abrupt end in Torpids, and there's no reason to suspect their Eight
will be much faster. Magdalen are behind Jesus. Traditionally one of the major
rowing colleges, they still haven't recovered from their implosion of 2017
and will probably fall to whoever emerges from the top of Div II. All of which
should give Catz at least
a couple of days to figure out who, if anyone, they're going to catch.
For the women it's a sense of déjà vi as, once again, they'll be chasing Mansfield and, as in Torpids, hoping they catch them before Mansfield catch the crew ahead — Lincoln in this case. Behind are Trinity, who spent Torpids forlornly chasing L.M.H. but picking up overbumps on the crews that L.M.H. had bumped. Now finding their positions reversed, hopefully Trinity will be more concerned with staying ahead of L.M.H. rather than aspiring to bump Catz. Either way, for Catz the first day's outcome looks like being the key that will unlock the rest of the week.
I'll be down at the boathouse maintaining the 'Racedesk Live' web-site, and sending out evening reports as usual to those on the RS mailling list. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
St Catherine's College 
Oxford University Rowing Clubs 
St Catherine's College Boat Club
St Catherine's Rowing Society
