The oldest race on the River Thames, The Wingfield Sculls, has pitted the best amateur scullers in the country against one another on the championship course since 1830. This year, we see a diverse field of entries from programmes nationwide ranging from national team athletes to recently graduated students and club stalwarts.
London Rowing Club: Josh Lyon
Returning as the defending champion, Josh Lyon won this event last year in the colours of Reading University Boat Club. This season, he has taken his talents to London Rowing Club following a distinguished university career. Over his four years at Reading, Lyons won six BUCS championship gold medals, with two more at the intermediate level. A phenomenally talented sculler, he struggled to have the ergo times required to be invited to the final round of national team selection- but regularly proved he was among the ranks of the country’s top scullers. Last autumn, he finished ninth overall at the Scullers Head of the River Race, winning the under-23 category. He would go on to race The Wingfield Sculls, where he was crowned the Champion of the Thames. In the spring, exploits in the single scull were limited by his focus on the quad, but he peaked with a championship silver at BUCS Regatta and an A-final showing on the Sunday of Metropolitan Regatta. He faces a challenging task in defending his title this year but has the experience on this unique occasion.
Agecroft Rowing Club: Graeme Thomas
The 2021 champion, Agecroft Rowing Club’s Graeme Thomas, is one of Britain’s greatest scullers. A well-decorated international rower, he debuted for the senior national team in 2011 but has had a career beset by injury. Selected for the quad in Rio, his Olympic debut was forced to wait due to injury. He rowed in the double in Tokyo, finishing fourth alongside John Collins. Following those games, he switched to the single scull and began to thrive. Domestically, he returned home after Tokyo and won The Diamond Challenge Sculls at Henley Royal Regatta before winning The Wingfield Sculls in the autumn. On the international stage, he established himself as one of the top single scullers in the world by winning gold in Lucerne and a bronze medal at the World Rowing Championships, a result as good as Britain had seen in over a decade. However, injury would again restrict him, missing all of the 2023 season before stepping into the quad for 2024 in the lead-up to Paris, where he would again finish fourth. Back in the single, where he saw so much success following the Tokyo Olympic Games, he will look to be named Champion of the Thames for the second time in his career.
Twickenham Rowing Club: Callum Dixon
A teammate of Thomas in the quad from Paris, Callum Dixon is far newer to the world of elite rowing. An elite sailor until 2020, Dixon is a graduate of the World Class Start programme previously based at Twickenham Rowing Club. Since that transition, he has quickly grown in the sport, making his international debut in 2022 at the Belgrade World Rowing Cup Regatta, where he finished just 1.4 seconds behind Graeme Thomas. Since then, he quickly stepped up to the senior team, racing in the quad for the 2023 and 2024 seasons, placing fourth at both the World Rowing Championships and Olympic Games. At the Wingfield Sculls, his only appearance came in 2021, where he finished fourth. However, with significant growth since then, he will expect to challenge his teammate for the win.
Clydesdale Amateur Rowing Club: Ben Parsonage
Coming down from Scotland is last year’s runner-up Ben Parsonage. The experienced sculler spent many years at Strathclyde University Boat Club, where he went from undergraduate to PhD. Here, he became known as one of the nation’s leading lightweights following his medals at BUCS regattas. Last season, he finished his Strathclyde career with a win at the European Universities Rowing Championships in the lightweight single before switching to his new colours of Clydesdale Amateur Rowing Club. He continued his success in racing internationally, winning a bronze medal at the Ghent International Regatta, qualifying for the Diamond Challenge Sculls, and winning another medal at the Home International Regatta. On the Tideway, the lightweight is smaller than his opposition but hopes he can again hang in against some of the best available south of the border.
London Rowing Club: Rui Xu
The other representative of London Rowing Club is Rui Xu. A Canadian international, he has been the shining star of Putney’s best sculling group for several years. On the Tideway, he has yet to return to the heights of his 2022 season, where he won the headship at both Pairs and Scullers Head of the River Races. Last season, the former University of Toronto standout flew to Chile to compete in the Pan-American Games for Canada, placing seventh. Back home, he stepped into the first eight for London Rowing Club, where he narrowly missed out on making it to the final of The Thames Challenge Cup. Now, back in the single, he hopes to rediscover the form of 2022. His 2021 performance at The Wingfield Sculls saw him come out best of the rest behind Graeme Thomas; this year, he will hope to repeat that performance at least as he builds a new campaign.
Prediction
The field contains several high-level domestic scullers. However, there is a difference between that and an Olympian. While the unknown factor is the level of training since Paris, I expect that they will set the bar for the rest of the field. As a result of his experience in the boat class and previous victory at this event, I will go with Graeme Thomas as my pick for the win.
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