Over two days of stunning weather and calm water, the new JMC rowers had their first races at the Aoraki 1k regatta on Lake Ruataniwha last weekend.
The standout result for the novices was second place in the final of the novice coxed octuple in a time of 3:55. In the 50% novice quads, all five boats (most actually 75% novice) qualified for the A final. Unfortunately, the wind got up late in the day and robbed us of the chance to see twenty JMC boys racing across five of the ten lanes.
Boys in their second year of rowing also returned some great results. Gus Carr finished sixth in the A final of the intermediate single, while Archie Gordon stormed home at the head of the B final in a time which would have put him fifth in the A final. A great result for his first race in a single. Ollie O’Connell also raced the B final. He was in second place with 150m to go but in a tight finish was pipped at the post by less than a third of a second. Gus also qualified for the A final in the club single, finishing ninth. These three combined with Artie Sweetman to comfortably win the only heat in the intermediate quad in 3:27. They would surely have taken the final but for the wind bringing the regatta to a slightly early close.
Given there was said to be six inches of snow on the ground in Twizel only four days earlier, we were lucky to have such a great regatta with only two of our races cancelled. The boys’ performances—and behaviour!— were excellent.
Racing continues with regattas on the Otago harbour this weekend and on Lake Dunstan at the end of the month.
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