St Catharine's College Boat Club

Bumped Robinson II

After a term disrupted by a two week stoppage due to ice on the Cam, it was very difficult to know what to expect heading into the first day of bumps, with only a shortened Robinson Head and Pembroke Regatta to get any idea of the relative strength of the crews around us.

The row down to the start was a bit nervy, as may be expected on the first day of bumps, with a typical "let's get all of the washouts out of the way on the practice one" practice start. The start of the actual race felt better, holding Caius III on station while gaining an unexpected whistle on Robinson just before the motorway bridge. This became two 10 strokes through the bridge, and from there we continued to eat up the distance before bumping half way down First Post Reach.

It turns out that the quick nature of the bump was aided by Robinson only rowing with 6 men for 15 strokes after the strokeman came off his seat. However, they all count, and now the task is to continue pressing upwards with a bump of Jesus III tomorrow.

As a strong boat starting low down in the W3 division, hopes were high for the W2 boat and they didn't fail to disappoint. Following a start which is best forgotten the crew quickly got into gear - chasing Christ's III who, depsite looking strong at first, rapidly faded allowing W2 to go in for a quick bump just before first post corner.

With a relatively inexperienced crew and tough opposition both in front and behind today, we were fairly uncertain about what the first day would hold for W1. However, the girls in the boat did themselves proud - pulling away from a chasing Selwyn boat right from the start, and gradually closing in on Magdalene ahead. The bump was made just before the Plough; narrowly denying Magdalene a bump on LMBC and getting us off to a great start to the week! 

This year's Lents M1 is somewhat under-strength, as we are missing Dave Allwood to injury and Harry Moss to unavoidable academic commitments. Nevertheless, we started the week confident of finally regaining the first division spot that was lost in my first year at Catz.

The first three crews bunched up a bit off the start, with us taking half a length off Churchill and Selwyn coming about half a length closer behind us. These relative positions stayed pretty much the same through First Post and Grassy corners, before we started grinding Churchill down on Plough Reach. Overlap came shortly after Ditton corner and, after Churchill had delayed the inevitable by some evasive steering, we bumped out just before the Railings.

All in all, it was a good first race for the four of our crew who had never competed in Bumps before, and a good start to the week for all Catz crews. May there be many more like it!

Entries are now open for Catz Cardinals Regatta - the most serious event of the racing calendar is back with even more imaginative ways of finding the 'best' crew on the day (Thursday 15 March). Entries are now open, see the race page.