Medals for College Rowers at the NZSS Rowing Champs

Students from the College Rowing Club continued their season of improvement and success with two medals at last week’s New Zealand Secondary Schools Rowing championships.

Known as the Maadi regatta, this year’s championships were held at Lake Ruataniwha on the outskirts of Twizel. Selection criteria for these championships are tough given the extremely high level of competition at this event, with over 125 secondary schools from right around New Zealand represented by around 2,100 students competing in over 600 races across the week! Pleasingly 25 of our rowers and coxswains were selected to travel to Twizel after their recent successes at regional and North Island championship events.

Racing in Twizel was held over the course of six days with heats and D-F finals on days 1 and 2, repecharges, semi-finals and C finals on days 3 & 4, and A & B finals on days 5 & 6. The weather was, for the most part, kind in what can be an unpredictable part of the country, with only Tuesday delivering rough weather which saw an afternoon of racing lost. As a result, crews that had to contest repecharge events found themselves in the unknown territory of competing in time-trial events rather than full races as the race schedule was compressed to make up time. Our crews responded magnificently, however, recording a number of top 3 times in this unknown format, and moving through to semi-final qualifying races.

All up, our rowers competed in a total of 18 events over all categories from Novice to Under 18, taking to the water in over 50 individual races in order to qualify for an impressive 7 A finals, 3 B finals and 4 C finals. No crew or individual finished outside these levels vindicating the tough selection criteria for this event.

Several notable performances over the weekend need recognition;

• The U15 boys continued to enjoy high levels of success, winning silver in the A final of the VIII. Unfortunately the IV wasn’t able to repeat its Gold medal heroics of the North Island champs but still placed a very creditable 5th in a highly competitive A final field.
• Our U18 Lightweight Girls IV again took out Bronze, beating both crews that had beaten them at the North Island championships, finishing close behind the top two South Island schools.
• Our U17 Boys Quadruple Scull crew similarly wasn’t able to repeat its North Island Gold performance, placing 5th and just 1.5 seconds short of the places in their A final. Their time, however, was the best of the season in a fiercely competitive race, highlighting how performances from all crews from the club have continued to grow over the season.
• U17 Quad and Single sculler, Ayden Lamont was subsequently selected by Rowing NZ to trial over Easter for a place in the North Island U18 squad following standout individual performances at both the North Island and New Zealand secondary schools championships.

Congratulations to all rowers in the club who competed so proudly for the College at Maadi, special congratulations to all place getters in all finals, and especially our medallists. On the back of this year’s results right across the season, College rowing is in great shape and great heart and we look forward to next season with our returning crews and new club members who have already started training with us.

Crews:

BOYS U15 8+ - SILVER MEDAL
Tom Mills, Ollie Strang, Thomas Brenton-Rule , Ethan Blight, Nicholas Lyons- Ramsdale , Harry Ramakers, Sam Morrow, Matthew Kelly, Samuel Ingleton (cox), Carl Vincent (coach)

GIRLS U18 4+ (L) – BRONZE MEDAL
Jacqueline Chang, Katherine Chang, Leah Allison, Ruby Houghton, Shenny Chiu (cox), Sophie Cunningham (coach)