2013 Titles- 1st place, CHG4x at NSR- SJ4x at HWR
Coach- Tom Pattichis
Gloucester Hartpury started the season fairly innocuously with an unimpressive 7th place at the Fours Head of the River. The school is described as ‘is the UK’s premier sport and education setting’ on their website and Hartpury Rowing ‘Start’ Academy is a unique joint initiative between Hartpury College, the GB Rowing Team and Gloucester Rowing Club. Therefore you expect the athletes to be of a high standard however, last year, they performed fairly averagely, not making any national finals in the quad. This year, on the other hand, they have shown an improvement curve throughout the season and recently took the prestigious CHG4x title from the clutches of Latymer Upper, their main rivals. They also won the junior quad category at Henley Women’s Regatta but Latymer were racing at senior level so the match-up was prevented.
The crew seems to be showing increasing speed as the season progresses as, before NSR, Latymer were undefeated in major competitions. Gloucester had finished an anonymous 5th in WJ184x at Wallingford, 11 seconds behind Latymer and 4 behind Eton Excelsior. But, following their impressive row in the CHG4x final in which they beat Latymer by a composed 4 seconds, they have truly ‘put the cat amongst the pigeons’ for HRR and shaken up what seemed to be a formality for a very strong Latymer crew. The match-up between these two excellent crews is a final that is practically written [No disrespect to Headington and Eton who, I’m sure, will refute that statement]. Coming into this years competition, I don’t really see a clear favorite as times were fairly much the same at HWR so, however it unfolds, it should be a classic.
This photo was taken from: http://www.hartpury.ac.uk/Hartpury-College/Hartpury-news/Hartpury-rowers-win-maiden-national-title/
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