St Catharine's College Boat Club

It's 2017! In hindsight we were about as well-prepared for today's race as Donald Trump is to be President. Stuart kindly switched sides and Wagstaff subbed back into the five seat to fill Jon's still-over-100kg shoes. The term so far started with a training camp in Cambridge, complete with ergs, small boats (apologies to Lawrence whose capsize was almost certainly my fault), circuits, weights, socials and of course, outings. This week achieved two things; getting Basile involved in a return trip to Kuda, and setting the crews for the term.

Following on from training camp, M1 have been again emphasizing the steady state to set a platform before we hit the high-rate work closer to bumps. Rolling into the first leg of H2H we therefore had not much idea of what to expect, and unsurprisingly span the wheels off the start, rowing about as gracefully as a herd of elephants marauding down the 2k course.  Bow-side's finishes were somewhere between the bottom of the shell and the river bed, and our much loved pause at the finish had somehow migrated to the front-stops region. Despite a shaky reach, we found some rhythm through the corners and finished off with a push to 34.

During the interval, a few decisions were made. Firstly we decided to rate-cap the next piece to try and find some efficiency, length and rhythm, and secondly we decided we were all a bit cold (somewhat unsurprisingly, given that our Friday outing was called off due to a frozen river). Doing our best to ignore the latter point, we lined up for the return leg. Despite holding a rate that was 2-3 pips lower that the downstream piece, we finished in a comparable time.

Overall we finished 9th out of the college boats, not breaking any records but definitely still in the pack. The next race is Pembroke Regatta in three weeks after a solid training block. Congratulations to W1 on a strong performance.

Provisional result: 42nd on the river, 5th College M3

For only the second time in recent years (that is, since online records began in the late 1990's), SCCBC were fortunate enough to enter 3 Men's eights into the Fairbairn cup. M2 and M3 had trained as one squad for the first 6 weeks of term, before splitting down into two separate boats. The strong technical base we have worked on showed, and M3 produced a solid but relaxed row, finishing in 17:47. Thank you to all the coaches, coxes and subs who have helped out, and I look forward to seeing how we build and improve for bumps next term. FTW!

Provisional result: 33rd on the river, 6th College M2

M2 and M3 had trained as one squad for the first 6 weeks of term, before splitting down into two separate boats. We spent this time working on a strong technical base. Most of this didn't really show for the first phase of the race, as we pushed the rate high with the result of a spirited but comparatively scrappy start. However, as we had our first push out of Green Dragon corner, we finally settled into a nice rhythm and began to make sustainable progress along the course. James, in only his first term of coxing, steered some beautiful lines, and we definitely emptied the tank as we came under the railway bridge, to the raucous cheers of M1 from the bank, with a time of 17:07. Thank you to all the coaches, coxes and subs who have helped out this term - bring on Lents!

Sunday, November 13th arrived. Every other college crew was tucked up in bed, enjoying a relaxing break from their undemanding training regimes. However, the Men of St Catharine's were not among them, as we arrived, decked out in the finest stash Powerhouse and Godfrey have to offer, at the University of London Boathouse, 6am sharp.

Jon, having been up since 3am the previous day stretching in readiness for this outing, mumbled something that sounded a bit like "where's my Pro Plus," then proceeded to jolt awake as a certain Chris Quarton wandered into the changing room. Despite not having rowed for a year, Chris played a crucial role in what was to follow (even if he was sitting at three). Thank you very much to Chris for subbing in last minute! Other Chris (Eddy), as self-appointed food, rest and warmth officer (my role is slowly dissolving into merely writing race reports) arrived wearing his normal 9234329012 layers and slightly indignant expression at being roped into another of my schemes. On this occasion, this may have proved to be wise as today we were sparring with UCL.

Wading out into the tideway with our borrowed Stampfli shell and wheel-less oars, we couldn't help but stare at the scale of the river, with virtually unlimited room for activities. Rowing up towards Richmond we were feeling remarkably at home as Sid had us rowing square blades with pauses. It took us a little while to realise we weren't stuck behind a novice crew on a river about 10cm wide, at which point Sid explained we kept catching up... a promising start.

As dawn broke, we spun and lined up along aside the Men from UCL. Over the next 45 minutes we battle-paddled with a crew that not all that long ago made the final day of HRR, and incredibly found ourselves taking down seat after seat. Yet it was never going to be that simple, as Sid's intuitive Cam coxing led to us taking a wonderful racing line round the corners. Unfortunately, as those readers who did GCSE geography will know, this is not the best option on a river that wide, and the rather smug UCL cox sailed past. After shouts of "isn't it a bit shallow here (#!?)" from the bows, something clicked and Sid began to bully the other crew out of the stream, allowing us to come back and claim victory for the day.

The true toll of a 20km+ battle paddle showed as we headed back to the boathouse, but that's a few extra miles on the clock and Fairbairns is fast approaching. Also we're all now back to full fitness thanks to super-sized malt loaves (what a time to be alive).