As the booms get cleared, and the boat tents get packed away following another Henley Royal Regatta, it is often hard to see behind the fog history and reputation of such a unique event. From The Stewards, Race officials, and competitors to the coaches, often some key cogs in what is the HRR machine are overlooked but in strong need of having a light shone on.
Although now becoming a perhaps overly-coined phrase, there really are unsung heroes behind the operations of this regatta. These people allow crews to race at the highest level in the finest boats supporting their achievements and skill. However, it’s well known that with every sea, it’s not always smooth sailing, and in the rowing world, this is where the support of boats from suppliers and repairers such as John Tetley and the Filippi team appears.
Come Friday of the regatta, John himself had been enjoying all that the regatta had to offer, as everyone should. But after an 8pm call from HRR Steward Andy Crawford, he quickly shifted into work mode. Unfortunately, the USA Women’s double had some issues during a training session. John describes his first encounter with the boat: “Still in my regatta finery, I went and looked at the boat to assess the damage – the bow ball and about 5cm of the bows was pointing at right angles to the rest of the boat!”. This was no easy feat to repair on such a tight turnaround, especially when needing the boat back in operation the following day.
Like any good professional, John began to act straight away: “I managed to straighten the bows and applied quick drying epoxy resin to the damaged area and clamped it all together.” This meant by the morning; a colleague was able to make the boat race operational and safe for the course. Despite only managing to put primer on the boat due to the strict time constraints, it “did not slow the crew down as they went on to win their event, and nobody knew there was any damaged to the boat!!”—a success story for the records.
This was not the only example of their excellent skills on show in the week. John’s first significant encounter of the week was an Eight, having “managed to argue with the booms and broke two of their Croker oars along with the rigger from their Empacher Eight”. Whereas this usually may be a simple fix or replacement job, this was turned into a difficult situation by the crew “using special cut down blades and having no spares. “We have to build them two new oars reusing their existing blade”. Yet again, John and his team provided the much-needed aid allowing the crew to hit the water at 7 am the next day.
Despite the numerous challenges thrown at them in arguably one of the busiest weeks on the rowing calendar, the Filippi and Croker team never failed to support multiple crews, athletes and teams in their progression through the regatta. Whilst this work often goes unnoticed, taking a chance to shed light on it made it so very clear to me how vital people like this are in the running of such an event despite often remaining in the shadows.
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