The final assessment of the season for the national team sees an invite only weekend of racing at Caversham, with the format of a time trial, semi finals and finals. For lightweights, I would imagine that they will race with the open-weight scullers and their results will be looked at separately.
Seniors
This season has seen two stand out athletes on the senior side in the form of Jamie Copus and Dale Flockhart. Both of these athletes took the top positions in both November and February trials and will be looking to consolidate their position ahead of the summer racing season. Jamie has been training and racing with Oxford Brookes, and Dale is up at Edinburgh. These guys have been a long way clear of the rest of the field so far this year and will both be looking to cement their positions as the leading lightweight athletes nationally this weekend.
The only other entries into the senior trial in February, Daniel Jones and Ben Parsonage both raced for London RC in an eight for Head of the River at the end of March. This boat placed third in the Lightweight Pennant and 61st overall. If these guys are racing this weekend they will want to get as close to the two mentioned above to try and force themselves into the senior selection picture.
U23s
The U23 event thus far has been dominated by Matthew Edge of Cambridge University. He has had an outstanding season, topping both November and February assessments. He then led Cambridge to an imperious victory over Oxford in the Lightweight Boat Race, and then to the Lightweight Pennant at Head of the River. He will look to put in a strong performance back in the single this weekend.
Matthew’s closest challenger over the season comes from their dark blue counterparts in the form of Nick Ryan. They have been separated by a similar margin (around 15 seconds) at both trials so far, so it will be interesting to see how this plays out over the shorter 2km distance of this trial.
The other two entries in February came from Matthew Cleugh and Finn Regan, but with neither of them starting, it is impossible to know where they will stack up against these two Oxbridge guys. For all of the U23s, it will be interesting to see how many (if any at all) lightweight crews are entered into events over the summer. Last season only saw the outstanding Olivia Bates race the single at Europeans, so it goes to show the level that these guys need to be at to give Pete Sheppard a decision to make.
Given the limited timeframe for lightweight events at an international level, the pressure is arguably on these guys more than anyone this weekend to justify their selection for respective events. Final trials is renowned for the quality of racing it produces as people bring their best performances, and this year will be no exception.
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