J16 2x
After a complete absence in this category at Pairs Head, St Paul’s School are moving the “big guns” of their J16 squad from singles into doubles. However, bar a few single sculls, every crew they entered into Wallingford Long Distance sculls came behind all other clubs, only in competition with each other at the bottom of their categories. These boys should gather themselves when they move into eights, but I wouldn’t expect high placings in any sculling events for this squad.
The stand-out crew in this event should be the Wallingford RC double. Will Mangion and Max Thompson won the bronze medal in the J15 2x category at the British Junior Rowing Championships, and so this double will have some serious speed, and with a change in stroke from Wallingford LDS, they have a good chance of winning this event.
Reading Blue Coat have no significant credentials in small boats as of yet, but they could always surprise us with some strong members of their J15 1st 8+.
J16 1x
In this category we see the return of Ollie Pizura of Reading RC, again racing a category above his age group. Off the back of a third place at Wallingford LDS, he’ll be looking to build on this, and again he looks to be a strong candidate to take the win on his home water.
John Kosobucki also performed well at National Schools’ with Magdalen College School last season, and now racing under the banner of Wallingford RC, should pull out a relatively strong result this weekend.
I’ve already shared my thoughts about Saint Paul’s School’s J16 squad as a whole in this stage of the season, but that said SPS-Waller and SPS- Calato didn’t perform quite as shockingly badly as the rest of the squad at Wallingford, and I can see them battling it out with the similarly sweep-prioritising Reading Blue Coat crews.
WJ16 2x
Achieving fifth place at a couple of weeks ago in J16 4x-, these girls have hit the ground running, and having split up into doubles will be looking to win this event in the absence of the unstoppable Henley RC J16 girls squad.
None of the other crews besides a low performing Abingdon RC crew have seen a big event this season, so there should be some tight competition from crews trying to establish themselves, particularly Reading RC, who performed well in J15 2x last year.
WJ16 1x
None of the top performers from Wallingford LDS have entries in the event, but the stand out here should be WRC-Shannon, who was placed around half way in a particularly competitive field at that event. HED-Little was part of a strong J15 double who appeared in the final at National Schools’ Regatta in that event. This should put her in competition with WRC-Shannon, so expect some good racing from these two.
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