After a brief hiatus from major junior rowing events, the Henley Long Distance Sculls event kicks off Saturday, November 6th, and will cover a distance of 3000 meters, from the bottom of Greenlands to the Royal Regatta finish. There will be mens and womens races from J15 to J18 in singles, doubles, and quads. The J15 4x+ event has a total of 11 boats from 8 rowing clubs, and it’s anticipated to be a highly contested race.
Wallingford RC:
The Wallingford Rowing Club has one boat registered for this race, led by Green. Walllingford RC does not have much experience in its J15 quads. During the Wallingford LDS regatta a few weeks back, hosted at their boathouse, they did not race a J15.4x+ boat. However, they have had impressive performances in their J16 quads, earning the top spot out of 5 with a time of 16:05.0. If they can harness these quality performances in the younger guys, they will surely be competitive in this race.
Henley RC:
The Henley Rowing Club will only be racing one boat, but will be racing on their home course. In addition to this, they have proven experience and times racing in 4x+ events. Jacob Len, the stroke seat of the quad, raced in the Marlow Regatta in the J14 4x event, and pulled an impressive time of 3:38 for the 1000m in the A Final, barely beating the Wallingford RC by a third of a second.
Great Marlow School RC:
The Great Marlow School will have two boats racing for them. Participating in the same event that the Henley Boat Crew did back in June, they were not able to put up times as fast as their competitors, but raced well nonetheless. In the first heat, they posted a time of 3:51.63, a little less than 4 seconds slower than the first crew. However, they went 8 seconds slower in the semi-final, which placed them in the B final, where they earned 4th place. Their second team was substantially far behind the first, earning a spot in the C final.
City of Bristol RC:
As with the Henley RC, the City of Bristol Rowing Club will only be racing one boat. In the Marlow regatta, Edward Ainsley — who will be racing in the Henley LDS — was in bow seat. They got off to a rough start in the first race, going a time of 4:24.71. However, they were able to drop 30 seconds between that race and the last, placing them first in their final. In a long distance sculling event such as the Henley LDS, preserving energy and hitting the gas when it counts will be critical to winning the 3000m race.
Royal Grammar School High Wycombe BC:
The Royal Grammar School will be racing two boats in the Henley LDS J15 4x+ event. Though they did not race at the Marlow regatta, two of their boats were able to race in the Wallingford Long Distance sculling event. The boats finished the course in 17:16 and 17:30, quite close to the 16:59 first place time.
Guildford RC:
Guildford has one boat registered for the race. Mantell was scheduled to race in the J14 4x+ event at the Marlow Regatta, but he, along with the rest of the team, withdrew before the draw happened. Therefore, there are no previous times to report from the Guildford Rowing Club. However, the team has a reputation for rowing well, so it would not be surprising to see Guildford pull a good time.
Claires Court School BC:
Similarly, Claire’s Court School Boat Club does not have many recent races in the younger quad events. But Claires Court School BC was the 2013 and 2014 British Champions for the J15 4x+ event, proving the capabilities of their younger guys on the water.
Prediction:
Though only putting one boat in the race, Henley Rowing Club will likely take home the win. This is largely based off of the J14 4x+ race results in the Marlow Regatta back in June of 2021, where they raced a faster time than any other boat crew in this race that attended. That beting said, many fast crews racing on Saturday did not participate in that regatta four months ago, so an upset could be in the mix.
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