By Aaron Sims
On a rather foggy morning in Chester on the 26th of March, John O’Gaunt fielded their first men’s VIII for the past ten years. The eight men racing on the day had to brush off the cobwebs on their sweep rowing practice, which ranged from seven months to thirty years, in order to give a performance they hoped for. For the race and an outing the weekend prior, LUBC kindly offered the services of their new Wintech VIII ‘HRH Princess Alexandra’ for the club to use.
The definitive mixed-bag crew consisted of bowman Matt Wilkinson, two seat Kieran Bell (the youngest in the boat at fifteen), three seat Glenn Stevens, four seat Martin Gray (the oldest in the boat at forty nine), five seat Phillip Bell, six seat David Hodbod, seven seat Steven Sullivan and strokeman Aaron Sims. The occupant of the little seat in the stern was Jennifer Tonkins, the women’s captain of LUBC who agreed to cox and to ‘keep an eye on her Princess’.
Aaron, who organised the crew, arranged it so that everyone would arrive in time to cheer on the LUBC women’s VIII racing in the first division and within it, the crew’s cox Jenny, racing at three seat. This was much to the dislike of Captain Pugwash who would have rather had another two hours in bed.
Having Aaron, Steve, David, Phil and Matt in the lineup, the boat was almost an LUBC old boys crew and thus the targets were set for a target time of eighteen minutes and to get as close to the University 1st VIII on time as possible. With one rather promising outing under their belt (for which David, currently training for an Ironman, cycled a full 55 miles from Bury and back), the crew took to the water.
As an IM3 VIII, the boat was drawn between Liverpool Victoria, who made their start before JOG had even finished turning, and Derby RC. The race was smooth and set with the crew holding a rate thirty consistently, closing in on Liverpool with every stroke. An excellent racing line and some well placed calls that would only be expected of a battle hardened cox, Jenny allowed the crew to hold off the gradually incoming Derby all the way to the line.
The final results show the crew placing 9th of thirteen in IM3 and 29th overall for the day’s racing with a time of 18.06.81. A very pleasing achievement considering the very limited time together as a crew.
Other results from the racing put the University 1st VIII fourteen seconds ahead of the JOG crew, placing 5th of six in IM2. The University 2nd VIII placed 6th of twelve in Novice and the Women’s VIII placed a very pleasing joint 3rd (with Agecroft) of ten in W.IM3. A former LUBC athlete, John O’Leary was also racing that day in Agecroft’s 1st VIII. They won Senior VIIIs and was the second fastest crew of the day, losing out by a mere second to Shrewsbury School, a fantastic performance.
The Lancaster Royal Grammar School also sent three crews to the event in the form of a J18 4x- which placed 4th of four, a J15 4x+ which came 7th of seven and a J17 VIII which placed 2nd of two.
With LUBC’s VIIIs off to Head of the River next week and JOG to attend Northwich Spring Head in a few weeks time, the Lune based will be well represented for the close of a very successful head season. Roll on the Easter training camp.
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