St Neots' Regatta - 25th/26th June 2009

Sudbury RC continued their sprint regatta season with a trip to St Neots. Spread over two days, the racing consists of 1000m on Saturday and a 500m sprint on Sunday. Saturday saw the student four of Chris Page, Ben Toocaram, Louis Watson, Barney Walker, coxed by Helen Taylor, further their improvement and success recently by winning the Intermediate 3 event, beating Peterborough in the final by 1 ½ lengths. The 8+ (the four joined by Pete Skellorn, Oli Mitchell, Michael Haynes and Jack Miller) had a more turbulent time with speaker issues resulting in the boat not making it round the infamous St Neots’ bend and colliding with the other boat. An unfortunate outcome as they had been winning up to this point. The Sudbury scullers received unlucky draws with John Bevan tousling with ex-elite scullers in his two events and Helen Taylor coming up against a Cambridge University sculler (apparently a Henley finalist in a quad this year) in her first race since returning from rowing across the Indian Ocean. Both lost to the eventual winners but will have great hope of success in the weeks to come. Skellorn and Miller also competed in their first double sculls race together and will look to improve in the coming regattas.



The shorter race on Sunday saw very close racing between all crews and some great race experience for the more novice crews from Sudbury. The novice four of Paul Adams, Lee Adams, Graham Morris, Jack Miller, coxed by Holly Adams won their heat but lost narrowly in the semi. Racing as a veteran four with Miller replaced by Jeremy Millbank and coxed by Ellie Adams, they again fought to the line but missed out by 2 feet. Mike Arnott and John Bevan raced in the highly competitive single scull events losing narrowly. Holly Adams and Lydia Lockyer competed for the first time together in the J14 double sculls and after a good start showed determination and resolve against a far more experienced crew. An encouraging start for this new combination. The veteran double of Jeremy Millbank and David Wasse led the final of their event until a few strokes before the end and a crab. Another close race and experience gained. Susie Moule and Sarah Watts showed their class in the Intermediate 2 double sculls event beating Peterborough and then Bedford in the final. Sarah has now lost her novice status! The student crews did not live up to their high expectations from the day previously and struggled to find their speed over the shorter 500m course (nothing to do with the night before of course). Hopefully it will be found for the Sudbury regatta being this weekend! Thanks to everyone who came to support-another great Sudbury turn out as ever.




More photos to follow...