Avon County Regatta Saturday 14th September 2003

Maidenhead Juniors (boys and girls), Dads and Veterans win 20 out of 26 events entered.

This was the final regatta of the season raced over a multi-lane (4 lanes) 450mtr sprint course.

Maidenhead entered 39 crews into 26 events and came home with a massive winning medal haul - winning 20 of the 26 events they contested and came away as the most successful club at the regatta. As well as the fantastic list of wins by our very successful junior section we should make mention of one or two other good performances. In the family doubles the club was represented by the Kerns family and the Cremin family. Both crews did very well against strong opposition. Sean and Emma Kerns won their heat and then went out in the semi-final. Henry Cremin and son Joshua raced through the heats and semi's to reach the final, in the final they could not match the pace of the other crews but they did extremely well to reach the final of this event. This was Father Henry's first race at a regatta!

The Wright sisters proved they could fly when they competed in the sibling doubles event. Winning their heat against boys and girls doubles and making the final they were up against a very strong boys double and two other doubles. In the final the Wright sisters pushed the fast boys double hard all the way down the course maintaining an overlap and finishing 2nd well ahead of 3rd and 4th placed doubles. This earned them the prize for the fastest girls double in this new sibling event.

Summary list of Maidenhead Rowing Club winners are as follows:-

1. WJ12 2x Carmel Bevan & Emma Kerns.

2. WJ13 1x Alice Ancora.

3. WJ13 2x Alice Ancora & Rebecca Kerns.

4. WJ14 1x Chrissie Wright.

5. WJ14 2x Chrissie Wright & Alice Ancora.

6. WJ14 4x Chrissie Wright, Alice Ancora, Rebecca Kerns Emma

Alington, cox Owen Davies.

7. J14 1x Philip Clapp.

8. J14 2x Philip Clapp & Joshua Cremin.

9. WJ15 1x Louise Entwistle.

10. WJ15 2x Charlotte Eynon & Louise Entwistle.

11. WJ16 1x Laurian Pepper with Kelly Edwards 2nd place.

12. WJ16 2x Laurian Pepper and Charlotte Eynon.

13. WJ16 4x+ Charlotte Weeks, Laurian Pepper, Kelly Edwards, Ally

Brooks, cox Owen Davies.

14. WJ 1x Jo Wright with Natalie Trinder 2nd place.

15. WJ 2x Jo Wright and Natalie Trinder.

16. Mixed Junior Double Dave Jones & Ally Brooks.

17. Mixed Vet & Junior quad Billy Brooks, Al Cook, Louise

Entwistle, Ally Brooks, cox Charlotte Weeks.

18. Sibling doubles Jo Wright & Chrissie Wright.

19. WVet Nov 1x Karen Philips.

20. Mens Vet 'C' doubles Al Cook & Billy Brooks.

This was another excellent performance from Maidenhead's Junior squad and a fine close to the 2003 regatta season.

Maidenhead Rowing Club Juniors and Veterans compete at Oxford City Royal

Regatta on Sunday 17th August. This year, for the first time, the event was run over two days to incorporate a Sprint Regatta on the Sunday. The Sprint Regatta was held over a 500m course, starting opposite Oxford University Boat Club and finishing at Long Bridges.

Maidenhead participated on the Sunday over the 500m Sprint course and competed in 8 junior events, 2 veteran events and one Novice event. The Maidenhead juniors continued their successful season by reaching the finals of all 8 events and winning 7 out of eight finals, an excellent performance. In the WJ12 single sculls Alice Ancora had to work very hard to win her event, in the final she was up against Jamieson of TSS. The 500m course was difficult with an s bend off the start. This caused Ancora difficulty in maintaining a correct line around these first two bends and as a result she was half a length down at the halfway mark, from here in Alice had to work very hard to get back on level terms, Alice did this and finished at the line 2ft ahead.

In the WJ13 single sculls Chrissie Wright had little difficulty in beating Bingham of Hinksey and then had a comfortable win over a Wallingford sculler in the final.

In the WJ14 single sculls Ally Brooks had an easy win over a sculler from Southhampton Coalporters, she also won her semi-final by 3 lengths and in the final she had a very tough race against Unsworth of Warrington who made the final in this event at National Championships. After racing neck and neck over the whole course Ally won by a canvas at the finish line.

In the WJ15 single sculls Maidehead had two scullers entered. Kelly Edwards and Lauren Connolly. Both these scullers did very well. Connolly went out to Drury of Wallingford in the semi-final after a very close race. Edwards had a good win (1.5 lengths) over Wale of Tideway Scullers School and in the semi-final Kelly won by 3 lengths over Hewlett from Hinksey Sculling School. In the final Kelly raced hard but was unable to match the pace of Drury from Wallingford finishing 2 lengths behind.

In the WJ13 double sculls Alice Ancora and Georgia Smith teamed up to race Hinksey Sculling School in a straight final. Both crews raced well over the course and at the finish line Maidenhead finished half a length in front to take the WJ13 doubles title.

In the WJ14 double sculls Ally Brooks and Chrissie Wright moved up from WJ13 to race at this higher age group. In a straight final these crews raced neck and neck down the course with Maidenhead crossing the finish line half a length in front to take the WJ14 doubles title.

In the WJ16 double sculls Jo Wright and Natalie Trinder raced against Eton Excelsior in the semi-finals and came home easy winners. In the final against Southhampton Coalporters Maidenhead led from the start and came home 2.5 lengths ahead to take the WJ16 doubles title.

Maidenhead's young crew of Georgia Smith age 13, Alice Ancora age 12, Ally Brooks age 13, Chrissie Wright age 13 and cox Lauren Connolly raced extremely well in the final of the WJ14 quadrupple sculls and despite a slight clash of blades at the halfway point Maidenhead came home winners of this older age catagory by 1 length.

Karen Phillips raced well in both the Womens Novice Sculls and the Womens Senior 4 sculls event. The competition was tough in the Novice sculls but Phillips of Maidenhead managed to make it through to the semi-finals.

Billy Brooks and Al Cook raced in a straight final against Sussex YC in Veteran C double sculls. Despite having a good scull Maidenhead were unable to match the pace of Sussex YC who steered the difficult course well and finished 3/4l ahead of Maidenhead at the finish line.

Maidenhead Rowing Club notch up 4 wins and several finalists at Molesey Regatta

Molesey juniors was a great day for our junior crews who were not competing at the National Championships in Scotland. Alice Ancora & Rebekah Kerns both won through to the finals and notched up wins in the finals of the WJ13 Double Sculls and the WJ12 Quad with Harriot Ingle and Emma Allington, With very convincing wins over all the competition. The smallest of margin was 1-1/2 lengths. Charlotte Eynon sculled to the final of the WJ14 single sculls and was leading with about 40 yards to go when she caught a crab and just lost on the line.

Rebekah Kerns made it through to the final in the WJ12 1X and lost by 1 length having led for the majority of the way. This was a good result taking into account the 8 or 9 times she had rowed over the course!

Alice Ancora had another convincing win in her WJ13 1x, she has not lost in a single since joining Maidenhead.

Robert Ashburner also showed great promise he put in a great performance with his first round, rowing through for a 1-1/2 length win. He had a good performance in the semi final but again like Charlotte caught a crab before the finish line and was overtaken. A bitter disappointment as he was forced to used different blades, due to a marshalling problem, which caused a conflict with equipment.

Emma Allington and Harriot Ingles won their WJ 12 2X's final.

Burway Junior Regatta

Maidenhead Rowing Club juniors win another 4 event wins.

With the return of the juniors from Scotland Maidenhead were able to successfully compete in a number of bigger boat events. Competing in the WJ12 Mixed Sculls both Rebecca Kerns and Alice Ancora did extremely well and beat some boys on route to the semi-final and finals. Rebecca made the semi-final before losing to a huge J12 boy and Alice made the final (she beat a J12 boy sculler in the semi-final who had not lost a race for 12 months!). In the final Alice could not hold off the much bigger boy sculler from Tideway Scullers.

However, Ancora did make it to the final of the WJ13 single sculls where she comformably won this event.

In the WJ13 quadrupple sculling event Maidenheads strong crew of Rebecca Kerns, Alice Ancora, Ally Brooks, Chrissie Wright with Tom Brooks as cox put up an excellent demonstration of quad sculling by coming home convincing winners against Molesey 'A' and against a Molesey 'B' crew who beat Marlow in the other semi-final.

In the WJ14 quadrupple sculling event Maidenhead's crew of Charlotte Weeks, Chrissie Wright, Louise Entwistle, Ally Brooks with Tom Brooks as cox were too strong for the Burway quad in the final and came home 2 lengths clear.

In the WJ12 double sculls event Maidenhead entered two crew who both made it through to the final after wins against Molesey 'A' and Molesey 'B' crews. Katie Lion and Carmel Bevan Maidenhead 'A' crews came home 2 lengths clear of Melody Allan and Harriet Wooldridge racing as Maidenhead 'B' crew.

In the WJ15 doubles event Charlotte Weeks and Laurian Pepper had a convincing win in the heat and semi-finals. In the finals they were up against a very strong WJ15 double from Molesey and raced hard over the whole course finishing just under half a length at the finish. This was a good result taking into account this was Moleseys top double sculler.

Our WJ15 quad of Natasha Broadbent, Becky Evans, Alice Ancora, Kelly Edwards with Tom Brooks as cox put up a good performance again against this strong Molesey quad and finished 1.5 lengths down at the finish line. This was good experience for this scratch quad.

Kelly Edwards, fairly new to racing in sculls competed very well and won through to the final of the WJ15 single sculls. In the final she raced well but finished 1 length down to a good sculler from Molesey.

In the J13 boys single sculls Butler of Maidenhead did well to win against Guildford and then record a semi-final win. In the final he put up a good effort and finished only 1.5 lengths down.

Maidenhead Rowing Club Juniors win Gold and Silver medals at the 2003 National Rowing Championships

This years National Rowing Championships was held at Stathclyde Park in Scotland with junior heats taking place on Friday 18th and junior semi's and finals on Saturday 19th July. This event is run over an International 2000metres six lane purpose built course. A brilliant time was had by all competitors and supporters and champagne was flowing in Scotland on Saturday night - no doubt you will get to see the pictures in due course!

Gold Medalists

Maidenhead Rowing Club junior 14 girls sculls ? Louise Entwistle and Alexandra Brooks became 2003 National Champions and proved that they are a force to be reckoned with in the future. Louise Entwistle aged 14 and Alexandra Brooks aged 13 put up a powerful performance throughout the competition. In their heat they were led to the 1500metres mark by Northwich Rowing Club with the rest of the field some distance behind. Maidenhead turned on the power in the last 500metres and quickly went past Northwich taking a six seconds lead and equalling the course record for this event.

Expectations were high for the final, this added pressure to these two young athletes. Despite this, the girls sculled strongly into a head wind and although being led to the first 500 metre mark Maidenhead drew level at 1000 metres and then used their fitness and power to draw away and win by some 4 lengths at the finish. This was an excellent achievement for these young girls.

Silver Medallists

Maidenhead Rowing Club junior 15 girls quadruple scullers Kelly Edwards, Laurian Pepper, Lauren Connolly, Charlotte Weeks stroke with Tom Brooks (cox) also put up a superb performance to win their Silver medals.

In the Friday heats it was Maidenhead's plan to finish in the top two positions to qualify for a direct route into the final and thereby avoid the repechages race. The race was going to plan with Maidenhead in 2nd position at the 1200metre mark ? suddenly Maidenhead stroke lost control of her blade which bruised her ribs, this caused the crew to stop rowing and valuable time (approx 6 seconds) was lost. Although Charlotte Weeks was in pain she managed to get going again and the girls raced very hard moving away from St Leonard's in 3rd place and passing Star RC in the final 500 metres to win their heat and qualify for a direct place in the final.

The final was a thrilling race over the whole length of the course. Maidenhead went off at its usual fast pace and was in equal second at the first 500 metres point, 1 length behind Kings School Worcester. During the second 500 metres Maidenhead put in some extra effort to stay with the faster crews and at the 1000metre mark the first four crews were level with Star Club and Upper Thames RC dropping back off the pace. At the 1500 metre mark Maidenhead moved into 3 rd place half a length ahead of Worcester RC. The final 500 meters was a gutsy performance from the Maidenhead girls with all crews racing it out for the medals, in the last 250 metres Maidenhead raised its rate of striking to 39 and moved up into 2nd place overtaking Kings School Worcester and now challenging Thames Tradesman for the Gold medal position. At the finish line the Maidenhead girls closed the gap to half a length and finished in 2nd place. A Silver medal was a very pleasing result to a hard seasons training.

Disappointment

The Maidenhead junior 15 boys of Dave Jones and Sam Ashburner will be very disappointed with not being able to compete in the finals of both the J15 single sculls and the J16 double sculls. Despite qualifying in pole position through heats and semi-finals for both of these events, Dave Jones was hit with some form of sickness bug that made him unwell for the finals - this resulted in the crew having to scratch from both finals. No doubt if they could have competed we would have expected to be in possession of two more Gold medals. Some consolation to the crew in the fact they will be representing Great Britain in the Anglo French match that will be held at Nottingham on Saturday 26th July.

Girls J14 sculler

Chrissie Wright aged 13 did very well in this event. In her heat she came third which qualified her for the semi-finals. The semi-finals was an excellent race for Chrissie - she gave it all she had on the day and just missed out on a final place by 0.5sec, had she been in the other heat then she may well have qualified for the final.

Boys J14 sculler

Max Gerrard did not have a good scull in his Friday heat so had to compete in the repechages for a second chance at qualifying for the semi-finals. In the repechage Max sculled much better and and was fighting for a top 3 position all the way down the course. At the finish line Max missed out on a semi-final place by just 0.9sec finishing fourth.

Girls J16 Double Sculls

Natalie Trinder and Jo Wright raced in the Friday heats and did very well to finish in 3rd place ahead of Tideway Scullers School and qualify direct for a place in the semi-finals. The semi-finals was as expected a tough race. Maidenhead had to achieve a top 3 position and beat crews who they had not beaten before. Maidenhead put up their best performance to date by coming through from 4th place in the last 250 metres to finish in that important 3rd position and qualify for the final by 0.8sec. The crew were ecstatic when they heard they had qualified for the final. In the final Maidenhead raced well but had to contend with 6th place. This was good progress at this tough level of competition.

Womens Lightweight sculls

Vicky Sims had one of the largest entries (31) in Women's Lightweight sculls. In her first heat Vicky did well to finish 3rd and with such a large entry only one crew went though to the semi-final, 2nd and 3rd places had to race again in the repechages for a place in the semi-finals. The repechage was a tough draw and Vicky finished 6th in this race.

This was a great display of sculling against the highest level of competition in the country and Maidenhead Rowing Club is proud of the performances of ALL the competitors who competed and represented Maidenhead Rowing Club in Scotland.

Maidenhead Juniors gain GB selection at Nottingham 12/13 July

David Jones and Sam Ashburner of Maidenhead Rowing Club competed in the J16 doubles trials held at Nottingham this weekend. This crew continued their winning ways by gaining selection to represent GB in the GB team to race against France at the end of July. The local Maidenhead crew who are still only 15 years of age put up an exceptional performance to come home outright winners of their trials against seven older J16 boys doubles.

Maidenhead's winning time of 5mins 27secs was 5 seconds faster than the second place crew and they achieved a 97.10% of Gold medal winning time at this higher age category, not bad considering they have one more year to compete at J16 level.

Maidenhead Junior Squad put up an Excellent Performance at The National Schools Regatta, held at Holme Pierrepont Nottingham on Saturday 25th and Sunday 26th May 2003

The Maidenhead Junior squad managed to win 2 golds, 1 silver and made the final in a junior girls crew event.

On the Saturday Maidenhead juniors competed in the double sculls events. The boys J15 double sculls of David Jones and Sam Ashburner competed against a field of 27 crews and demonstrated that they are true champions by winning in style their heats, the semi-final and then the final by a clear 11 seconds. They were presented with Gold medals and the City of London Trophy for J15 boy's Double Sculls.

The girls competed in the WJ16 double sculls and with 16 crews competing for the Simon Sears Cup Natalie Trinder and Jo Wright did extremely well to qualify through in their heat for the semi-finals. In the semi-finals they sculled well beating a crew they had lost to in the past but did not manage to finish in the first 3 to make the final.

On the Sunday Maidenhead juniors competed in 3 sculling events and 1 coxed quad sculls event.

After winning gold medals in the boys J15 double sculls, Sam Ashburner raced in the J15 single sculls whilst David Jones moved up to compete in the J16 sculls event. Both these events were strongly contested with 23 national scullers competing for the J15 title and 25 national scullers competing for the J16 title. Again Maidenhead demonstrated that they have trained hard and developed good technique. Both scullers won their heats and semi-finals. In the finals Sam Ashburner led all the way to win a gold medal in the J15 boys event. In the J16 finals David Jones raced very well overtaking the 3rd place sculler at 1250mtrs and finishing a very respectable 2nd to take the silver medal in this higher age category.

The J16 girls of Jo Wright and Natalie Trinder entered the WJ16 single sculls event but were against very strong opposition and unable on this occasion to qualify for the semi-finals.

The J15 coxed quad sculls had 20 national crews competing for this title. Maidenhead's crew of Laurian Pepper stroke, Lauren Connolly, Louise Entwistle, Kelly Edwards and cox Thomas Brooks experienced some first class multi-lane racing. In their first heat they led from the start and came home heat winners rowing efficiently with Evesham in second place and Bedford High School in third place, this put these 3 crews into the semi-finals. The semi-finals was lined up to be a tough race with Maidenhead up against other heat winners. Maidenhead went off again at a fast pace but were led by St Leonards, Kings Schools Worcester 'A', Putney High Schools and Evesham with Sir William Borlase also pushing for a top 3 finishing position to qualify for the final. At half way Maidenhead moved up into 4th place ahead of Sir William Borlase and Kings School 'A'. At 1500 mtrs there was about 1 length separating 2nd, 3rd and 4th crews with Maidenhead in 4th place. Maidenhead pushed hard in the last 500mtrs and went past Evesham and moved into 3rd place finishing 0.2 of a second behind Putney High School in second place. This qualified Maidenhead for the final.

The final was a very tough race as expected and again Maidenhead raced well and managed to overhaul Molesey RC in the last 250mtrs to finish in a very credible 5th place.

Special mention and very well done to Sam Ashburner and David Jones for not only winning gold medals but how they won in such convincing style, they are both future GB material and under their experienced coaches Eric Sims, Tom Jost, John Rayer and team I am sure they will achieve much greater things for the club.

Junior Crews Win at Regional Time Trials

Maidenhead Rowing Club Sshow Good Form and Win in three classes at BEDFORD HEAD

Maidenhead Rowing Club show good form and win in 3 classes at Bedford Head. Competing at Bedford Head on Sunday 9th February over a 2000 meter course Maidenhead were well represented and came home outright winners in 3 events. Excellent performances came from the Mens Development Squad and the Junior 15 Boys crews.

The 1st win for Maidenhead came from the boys J15 coxed quad of Michael Kirby, Tom Bennet, Max Gerrard and Oliver Truswell coxed by Jemma Brooks. The crew went off at a fast pace and sculled strongly all the way down the course. The crew finished their race in a time of 7mins 18secs, 4 seconds ahead of second place Kingston Grammer School Boat Club.

The 2nd win for Maidenhead came from the Mens Development Squad (Neil Harvey, John Turner, Huw Jenkins, Darren Todd) coxed by Oliver Truswell competed in Senior IV coxed fours and came home winners of their division in a fast time of 7mins 3 secs. This was an excellent start to a new season from a Novice crew that only started rowing at Maidenhead last year.

The 3rd win came from Maidenhead’s Veteran ‘C’ four of Orlando Fricker, John Rayer, Al Cook and Billy Brooks, coxed by Owen Davis. This experienced crew just about managed to pull hard enough to win the Veteran ‘C’ Coxed Fours category by 9 seconds from Leicester RC in a time of 7 mins 13 secs. A rigger problem just before the start was fixed just in time to make the start when a spectator supplied an adjustable spanner to tighten up the rigger.

A slight crew change to the Mens Senior IV crew (with Alan Shave replacing Darren Todd) and the four competed again in the Mens Novice coxed IV’s. This was a very exciting race down the course, at one point the crews were 3 abreast and Maidenhead had to squeeze past two other crews, Charlotte Weeks who was coxing did well to steer around these two crews and finish the course in a time of 7 mins 16secs to be placed 2nd in the Novice IV Division, only one second behind the winners University of Kent.

The womens J17 crew of Jemma Palfrey, Rebecca Budd, Jemma Brooks, Harriet Grainger, Sarah Collyer, Amy Sharp, Sally Davies, coxed by Owen Davies were joined by Jennifer King from the Womens squad at stroke and with no Junior event they had to move up to Senior IV status. This young crew rowed well and recorded a time of 7 mins 56 secs.

The Maidenhead Junior Girls squad competed in the Junior 14 and Junior 15 quad fours events and with a number of ‘A’ squad members missing the junior crews did well and gained valuable racing experience.

The Girls Junior 14 ‘A’ quad had to move up to race as the J15 ‘C’ crew due to a last minute crew change. Laurian Pepper J15 joined J14 members Louise Entwistle, Charlotte Weeks, Ally Brooks, coxed by Lauren Pepper. This crew did exceptionally well to finish 4th out of eleven J15 crews in a time of 7 mins 44 secs and only 6 seconds behind the winners.

The Girls Junior 15 ‘A’ crew of Charlotte Weeks, Lauren Connolly, Laurian Pepper, Kelly Edwards, coxed by Laura Vaughan also had a good scull and finished the course in a good time of 7 mins 52 secs. The Girls Junior 15 ‘B’ crew of Lauren Connolly, Kelly Edwards, Katherine Alington, Laura Vaughan, coxed by Oliver Truswell competed the course well and finished in a time of 8 mins 19 secs.

The Girls Junior 14 ‘B’ crew became a composite with Star RC and had two crew changes on the day. Hayley Smith (J13) from Star RC and a younger member from Maidenhead’s J12 squad - Carmel Bevan who is only eleven joined the crew coxed by Jemma Brooks. They had a very tidy scull down the course and finished in a time of 9 mins 7 secs.

The Girls Junior 14 ‘C’ crew made up of Ally Brooks, Charlotte Weeks, Louise Entwistle, Carmel Bevan with cox Oliver Truswell put up a very good performance to finish 3rd in the division in a fast time of 8 mins 17 secs beating Bedford High School ‘A’ team by 15 seconds.