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Head of the River Race 2016
Saturday 19th March
1st Men's VIII
Bow: Fred Benham-Crosswell 2: Matt Simpson 3: Quentin Gouil 4: Ollie Russell 5: Stephen Kindness 6: James Henderson 7: Euan Beck Stroke: Jon Swain Cox: Basma Khogeer
120th overall in a time of 19:44.65 (3rd fastest Cambridge college)
In classic CBC M1 style, we arrived to find all the other boats rigged up whilst ours was still on the trailer. After a quick rig and team chat we pushed off the pontoon and rowed across to the Surrey inshore zone. Being not used to the choppy tideway water, our rowing was tense and a bit scrappy. To settle our nerves Ollie perfectly executed a tactical crab, there was nervous laughter from the crews around us as they saw how well it was done.
Marshalling was disappointing, the usual HoRR gale-force winds and rain never arrived, and we were forced to endure pleasant sunshine. In addition to this the crews around us all possessed the ability to keep their boats straight, so the carnage we'd been eagerly awaiting never materialised.
The marshals told us to spin and row down to the start line, the row down from outside ULBC to the start line was much more determined and focussed than any of our rowing had been so far in this crew. We build up to race pace under Chiswick bridge and crossed the start line at a solid R35-36, which we maintained as we pushed off the bridge until striding out onto a solid R32-33. Barnes bridge and Chiswick pier went by quickly, and we were inching towards FaT as St. Aiden's started to move towards us. Around the Chiswick Eyot the water was rough, and St. Aiden's were starting to close in on us. By Hammersmith they were level with us, and Basma did a great job to not concede the racing line. We had a great battle with St. Aiden's through to Craven Cottage, never letting them get past us with a few minor blade clashes thrown in. By this stage we'd both overtaken FaT, and Radley College had come to join the party making the river really crowded. I don't remember a lot of the sprint from the black buoy apart from pain, we crossed the line with everyone in the crew having given everything they could.
After a disappointing bumps, 3rd out of the colleges was a massive result, and hopefully shows that bumps was just bad luck. Sets us up nicely going into May term.
Uploaded Monday 21st March, 13:39