By Becca Robinson
You can’t fail to notice that is has been an unusually wet November. With both 4s Head of the River in London and our own York Small Boats Head being cancelled in the last three weeks, it was with pent up excitement to finally compete that the Boat Club headed to Rutherford Head on the river Tyne. But it was not all plain sailing to get there! UYBC’s boat house is built on a flood plain and one cannot fail to notice that the river is most definitely flooded; so flooded, in fact, that the boat house has become submerged beneath two feet of water. Dedicated members of UYBC had to wade through the water to get to the boats.
The joy at finally making it to a race was short lived when at 9am, the temperature gauge still read 1 degree Celsius. This is unpleasant at the best of times, but with the prospect of a 30-60 minute wait at the start line in little more than lycra, it is enough to make you dive back in the heated bus and demand to go home! However, the training and race deprived crews didn’t let it damped their spirits. Unsurprisingly, given the fact that no one had trained in their boats for over two weeks and one crew had never been in a boat together at all, there were no wins this time. There was, however, some very respectfully placed finishes and all crews thoroughly enjoyed themselves.
The crews that went off in division one were two men’s 4s and a women’s 8. The top 4 consisted of the crew that should have competed in 4s head – Dan Steele, Oscar Neilson, John Appleton and Ben Coverdale, coxed by Ashley Haycock and the second 4, a completely scratch crew, contained Dane Moore, Josh Clarke, Miles Whitehead and Chris Fury, coxed by Alice Taylor. The top boat finished a very respectable 3rd place, losing only narrowly to Sheffield and Edinburgh Universities.
The women’s 8 was made up by Katharina Auersperg, Hannah Kirton, Charlotte Bentley, Alex Mahan, Becca Robinson, Rosy Temple, Claire Kayser and Lara Wainwright, coxed by Ngaio Simpson. They came 7th out of 15, however overtook 3 boats throughout the course and were never overtaken themselves; a superb performance.
The afternoon brought the turn of a women’s 4 and quad and a men’s 8. The women’s 4 were Hannah Kirton, Charlotte Bentley, Katharina Auersperg and Rosy Temple. They were coxed by Emily Scorey. The women’s quad contained Pippa Maloney, Catherine Oliver, Sarah Powell and Natalie Caroll. Again, neither crews won but both finished well in their categories. The men’s 8 followed the women’s 8 of the morning, by finishing comfortably in the middle of the group. With actually training both crews stand to go far. Their crew consisted Dan Steele, Oscar Neilson, John Appleton, Ben Coverdale, John Underwood, Josh Clarke, Tom Bulpitt and Chris Fury, coxed by Ashley Haycock.
This is the last race of the term for the boat club. They now hold their breaths that the river will go down enough to get some training in before the end of term, and also to get the new novices out to learn to row. But with the way the crews looked this weekend on no training next term bodes extremely well for UYBC.