Bedford Head

Henley Rowing Club dominated Bedford Head race on Sunday, competing in 30 of the 85 events and winning 14 of them.

The 2000 metres course is short for a head course but is quite demanding on the steering with a number of narrow low bridges to negotiate as well as a long bend and two weirs which have a tendency to pull the boats off line towards them.  The Head race allows crews to compete in any of the 8 divisions running through the day, adding to the excitement of not knowing the final results until the very last race is won.  However, on the day it meant that the crews competing in the middle divisions had to cope with the disadvantage of exceptionally strong headwinds.

With a small squad of eight, the Senior Men came away with five wins, in addition David Read, who normally trains and races with the seniors, won the Junior sculls and was the fastest sculler overall.  The Men’s coxed four of Brown, Jennings, Coombes and Friend produced an excellent row in a strong headwind to win the Senior 1 event against good opposition, while old campaigners Jennings and Brown stormed to victory in the Elite coxless pairs and then had a more leisurely row to win the Veteran B event.  Friend and Coombes sculling together for the first time won the Senior 2 double sculls by a convincing margin, as did Richard Guiver who probably produced Henley’s best performance of the day to won the Senior 4 single sculls.  Paul Crooke in his first competition did exceptionally well, finishing 10^th in the Novice sculls.

The Senior women also had a good day, with wins in Senior 2 pairs and Senior 3 fours.  In the pairs, Pankhurst and Hocking were fortunate to find all their opposition in one heat and in possibly the worst headwind of the day raced aggressively and well to win by 22 seconds from second place Norwich Rowing Club.  The Senior 3 four, with cox Lucy Mills joining the quad scullers, raced exceptionally well after using the first half of the course to get used to one oar instead of two and winning by one second in a field of thirteen crews.  Their time of 7.55 was four seconds slower than the Senior 2 four in which the successful pair were joined by Leondiades, Davis and cox Mills to finish a close third in their division.

Henley junior girls’ squad had an exceptionally successful day contributing 6 wins to the Clubs total. The girls junior squad had a clean sweep of the senior women's quads events winning Senior 3, Senior 4 and Novice. The Senior 3 quad comprised the under 16 girls of Smith Willis, Robinson, Griffiths and Lewington, while unhappy with their row, took advantage of the better conditions when they raced to beat the club’s Senior women (Mann, Holland,  Hookey and Fellowes) by 5 seconds.  The girls repeated their victory in the Senior 4 quads with Davis replacing Robinson. This was a very convincing victory finishing 16 seconds ahead of local crew Bedford High School. Bedford High School suffered further defeat at the hands Read, McIntosh, Moore and Robinson beating them in the Novice quad event. The Junior coxless four of Johnson, Read, Moore, and Davis beat two Dame Alice Harpur fours to win the event. In smaller boats Davis and Lewington won the Women's junior double sculls comfortably from Oundle School.  Racing in the last division of the day Moore and McIntosh picked up their second win of day in the heavily contested Women's novice double sculls just ahead of the Henley lightweight junior double of Gilson and Boyd who in turn were well clear of third placed Peterborough Rowing Club.  The Juniors winning streak ran out when they came up against St Neots in the Junior quads.  Thomas, Darke, Gilson and McIntosh finished second against a crew of potential GB squad members, who were also the winners of this years Schools Head. The Junior girls of Gemma McIntosh, Caroline Green, Elley Lewis and Hannah Boyd competing in the Women's senior 2 coxless four event were the one crew to suffer from the difficulties of the course when they managed to wrap themselves around the buttress of one of the bridges. Fortunately none of the girls or any of the equipment received any injuries.

This was a fantastic day for the Henley Rowing Club, achieving success at all levels in both sculling and rowing, showing that the dedication of the Club’s athletes in training is paying off in competition and bodes well for forthcoming Regattas, as the season is about to begin.

Bedford Pictures