New South Wales Rowing Championships 2025 – Men’s U21 Eight Preview

Photo Credit: Rowing NSW

Twenty-nine crews, four heats, two semifinals, one final, and one winner: that’s the situation in the Men’s U21 eights at this year’s New South Wales Championships. While conditions won’t be too hot, three runs down the course means it truly is survival of the fittest. But who comes out on top?

School Crews

We know that school crews are some of the fittest, and they’ll need to be. With a number entered into the schoolboy and U21 eights, the best could have a massive five 2000m races on Saturday. At the time of publication, there were schoolboy heats from 10.10, the final at 11.45, the U21 heats at 11.50, the semi-finals at 2.35, and the final at 3.55.

We’re expecting either the timings to change or a number of scratchings, but as things stand the best of the Victorian school crews are the Scotch College crew of Angus Moloney, Lachlan Lawson, Adrian Marro, James Temple, Joe Collingwood, Hugo Pernell, Ted Burney, Fletcher Douglas and Sebastian Pagnin. They’ve got wins in this season’s Melbourne Head, Barwon, and APS Regattas and will be very tough to beat.

Of the Sydney schools, St Ignatius’ Harry Kelly, George Field, Angus McGrath, William Bryant, Montague Hyles, Julian Carr, Zachary Hyde, Harrison Davis and Henry Burton are the crew to beat. They blitzed the field at last weekend’s Shore School Regatta, beating Shore’s Joshua Frape, Oliver Edwards, Jasper Halstead, Luke Robinson, Oli Harvey, Charlie Galligan, Ben McHutchinson, William Kellett and Callum Zhu by over eight seconds. While Scotch and St Ignatius are currently drawn in different heats, it’s worth keeping an eye out if the two race each other during this regatta.

While these two are the standouts, plenty of other first eights will be looking to make a mark. The Xavier College crew of Bill Reynolds, Luke Punt, Henry Somerville, Lincoln Vuna, Anthony Costa, Rory Somerville, Anders Spralja, James Glass and Lucas Murphy finished second behind Scotch at the recent Barwon Regatta, while Shore’s Josha Frape, Oliver Edwards, Jasper Halstead, Luke Robinson, Oli Harvey, Charlie Galligan, Ben McHutchinson, William Kellett and Callum Zhu were second behind St Ignatius at last weekend’s Shore Regatta. Melbourne Grammar School, Newington and St Kevin’s are looking to give their rowers plenty of experience with three crews entered each. Brighton Grammar, Caulfield Grammar, Geelong College, Geelong Grammar and Wesley College are all bringing crews up from Victoria, while locals Kings have two of their crews entered.

Club Crews

It’s a little easier for the club crews, although many will race in smaller boats earlier in the regatta. Victoria’s Melbourne University and Mercantile are bringing their Boathouse Drive rivalry to the Sydney International Regatta Centre. Melbourne University’s Beppe Daly, Harrison Cameron, Luke RyanH, Ted O’Malley, Benjamin Marchant, Lachlan Idle, Nicholas Bryant, Amos Kirk and Josh Feferkranz includes 2024 Victorian representatives Marchant, Kirk, Bryant and Feferkranz; Mercantile’s Archie Critchell, Miles Cullen, Joe Lee-Conway, Ethan Brown, Edward Burgess, Sam Chin, James Simpson, Alessandro Marro and Zane Takla are less experienced but no doubt just as fired up to get one over their neighbours.

There’s plenty of talent in the local club crews though, with all three including a recent Australian junior representative. The UTS crew of Edward Kelly, Kalen Routley, William Pender, Will Clubb, Lawson Banks, Joe Lynch, Jack Power, Luka Milozzi and Ryder Taylor includes 2022 U19 world champions and 2023 Australian representatives Lynch and Taylor. Sydney Rowing Club’s Jackson Gursoy, Matias Moloney, Matt Potter, Ambrose Hennessy, Tomas Moloney, Frase Burdett, Henry Pursehouse, Maxim Moloney and Sebastian Kladnig has two Australian representatives in Matias and Tomas Moloney, while the Sydney University/Newcastle University composite of Sebastian Atterton, Finlay Mitchell, Alexander Tetley, Charles Baker, Trephon Stambolie, William Rogers, Campbell Wickham, Gus Ciesiolka and Jonathan Yates has Australian U19 single sculler Rogers in their ranks.

Prediction

While it’s unlikely in the women’s U21 eights, but could one of the school crews win the men’s event? While the battle between St Ignatius and Scotch promises to be gripping, the extra schoolboy races may just take too much out of them. With this in mind, we’re going with UTS ahead of Sydney, with Melbourne University taking bronze back to Melbourne.

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Stuart John

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