Road to Henley – In the Grind

As I begin writing this, I’ve been sat on a bus for nearly half a day, and I’m not even halfway home. I’m slightly sunburnt, tired, and fed up of the music choices of the squad on the bus. I’m also immensely proud of the grind that the boys have put in, and the results that have followed on from the summers work.

In the last weekend of the summer break, we went away for the first regatta of the new year and we cleaned up. The quad crew was running as it had for the remainder of camp, after one of the key athletes left due to illness. We were still waiting to seat race for the final line up which was planned to happen once we were back at school The crew was moving excellently together, and very comfortably won in the quad, as well as storming to a win with our top double. Victory seemed comfortable – it barely looked like the crews were sweating at all, despite the hot weather.

Once back at school after the summer we ran a quick seat race to determine the crews current line-up, which was something that we had been waiting to do since we were unable to test on camp. With some close and exciting racing in coxed quads, we were able to determine the line-up that we are taking forwards towards the national championships at the end of March. Since this selection, the boys have redoubled their training efforts, and it really feels like they are solidifying as a unit. They’re really taking ownership of their training, organising altered training times to suit around some of their part time jobs – jobs that they’re using to save obsessively for flights to the UK.

Back to the bus. We’re on our way home from the New South Wales state championship regatta, an excellent three days of racing in which we performed excellently. We are confident that the boys are exactly where we want them to be. NSW states has a very high standard of rowing, many of the same competitors as will be at nationals are in attendance, due to them sharing a home of the Sydney International Rowing Centre, in Penrith. I shan’t say too much about the specifics of results or races, but the mood heading into the next 5 weeks towards the national championships and Henley qualification is electric. These next weeks are going to fly by, I’m going to be away with different subsections of the school rowing team every weekend racing until the end of march. It goes like this every year, once rowing camp is complete, everything speeds up and all of a sudden the nationals are upon us. This year, we’re feeling ready. We know who our main competition will be when we’re back in Penrith next month, and we’ve got a few tricks up our sleeves to make sure we come out on top – giving us the boost towards winter training and Henley.

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