With the Head season well and truly underway, Fours Head represents the first true test of club rowing on a national stage this season. With the first stage of senior and U23 trials having just gone earlier this month, this is our chance to see larger sweep and sculling boats in action, sowing the seeds for latter season rivalries culminating at the Head of the River. With the cancellation of last years event, this is the first time in two years this event will be run: and its going to be a cracker.
London Rowing Club
After several up and down years, London RC is firmly back at the forefront of British club rowing. Nowhere was this regain in form more apparent than at Henley Royal Regatta 2024, where the club reached the final of the Wargrave and the semi final of the Thames Challenge Cup’s, an achievement that would have been unthinkable just three short years ago. As the saying goes, success breeds success, and despite falling short of achieving wins to reflect last years stellar season, the London lion looks set to roar again. Having won this event relatively smartly over Marlow by some eight seconds in 2022, (even despite a time penalty), this years crop are as strong as ever. The single entry contains several stalwarts of the London mens programme over the past couple of years, including former U23 European Champion and Edinburgh University Boat Club alumni Graham Ord and previous Thames and University of Bristol rower Arun Jackson backing him up. To say that London are going to walk away with the win would be incredibly disingenuous to the competition, this is club rowing after all. What is true however, is would very surprising if this crew does not at least place well in this event, given the talent at their disposal. One to watch for certain.
Tideway Scullers School
A club for whom sculling is quite literally in their DNA, the numbers speak for themselves. Twenty-one world championship rowing medals in four years, two Henley Royal Regatta wins in the Diamond Jubilee and Fawley challenge cups respectively and numerous solid performances in both sweep and sculling since their foundation, a Tideway Scullers School sculling boat is one to be feared and revered in equal measure. Having not entered this category the last time it was run, TSS have a entered two boats more or less made up of athletes who raced in HRR at the back end of last season, including three quarters of the Britannia Challenge Cup crew (Sam Railson, Scullers Head champion Nick Palmer and Dimeji Ogunyoye), with Hamish Murray completing the lineup. Not to be outdone, the other Tideway crew contains within it a certain recently graduated Syracuse U23 European medalist by the name of Laurence Joss, who presence elevates an already exceptional club quad into one that might be capable of winning. Tideway always puts out good sculling boats, but they will have a real battle on their hands to ensure that London don’t walk away with two titles in a row.
Derby Rowing Club
Whilst the south has seen the rise of Hinksey and Surrey, and the north of Tyne Amateur and Royal Chester, the midlands have produced a new giant that can arguably rival them all: Derby Rowing Club. A solid regional player for quite some time, Derby exploded onto the national scene in 2023, finishing in the top 10 at Pairs Head, winning the Davidson Award at Fours Head, qualification into Henley Women’s Regatta and Henley Royal Regatta and a top 50 finish at Head of the River. Two British championship gold medals followed in 2024, as well as a win at HWR over Cambridge 99 in the Thames Challenge Cup at Henley. With the building of success that Derby have had over the past couple of seasons primarily having come from sweep, safe for a gold medal in Op Club 4x at last year British Senior Rowing Championships, it will be interesting to see if these athletes can brave the unpredictability of the tideway and bring home some tin to the East Midlands. Win or lose, a good performance from Derby has the potential to set in motion another impressive head season in motion and maybe even signify an even better summer.
Prediction
London have been stronger in sculling for a few years now and barring a mishap, I would expect them either to place well or win the event. Tideway Scullers will probably be the closets challengers in terms of quality, but Upper Thames, Agecroft and Derby all look as if they have potential to make a concerted challenge for the top few places.
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