Last Sunday the Reading Small Boats Head Race took place on a 3,300 metre course from below Mapledurham to Caversham Bridge on a part of the river with several bends and narrow channels between islands.

Henley entered several junior crews and came away with wins in three categories.

Charlotte Mills first of all did very well winning WJ17 Single Sculls in 16.32 minutes by the smallest of margins beating two Headington scullers into second and third place by 0.1of a second and 4 seconds respectively.

Meanwhile Gemma Hall came away with a very convincing win in WJ18 Single Sculls in 15.55 minutes also beating two Headington scullers into second and third place while Abbie Stephens came fourth beating a further two Headington scullers.

Also sculling were the J16 girls, Hannah Douglas, Georgie Roberts and J17, Beccie Norman who completed the very challenging course in their single sculls.

The J14 Quad of Will Hayes, Tom Sorotka, Malcolm Lindsay ,Andrew Lewis and Bradley Ralph as cox completed the course in a very creditable time of 15.15 minutes but were the only entry in their category whilst the WJ14 Quad of Ella Seabury Ruby Cooper Ruby Fletcher Caitlin Sutherland and Elena Cotton as cox were disappointed in coming fourth but less than 2 seconds separated them from second place in a category of evenly matched crews.

The WJ15 Double Scull of Izzy Pratt and Abbie Saddler gave a gutsy performance having been kept at the start for long time in the rain and managed to gain a creditable third place. A WJ15 Quad of Millie Marsh, Didi Horseburgh Wade, Hollie Hancock and Jenny Norman with Alice White coxing was shuffled around at the last minute due to illness exceeded expectation by sculling technically very well although missing out on the top placings.

However it was the WJ15 Quad of Maddie Wynn Jones, Mollie Thorp, Abbie Roels, Sadie Maunder and Christy Stephens coxing that pulled off a convincing win in a fast time of 14.58 minutes with a powerful row. The whole squad showed great determination which bodes well for the coming season.