St Ives and Henley Women’s
Seventeen members of the adult and junior squads took to the water at St. Ives Regatta on a long and sunny summer Saturday. There were six victories in total.
Morgan Moriarty went one better than last year and won the Open Men’s single sculls category. He then took to the water with his brother Gareth Moriarty to win the Open Men’s double sculls category against a strong crew from Lea RC.
On the junior side Martha Bullen won a close race in the Women’s Junior 16 category and Amelia Maskell competed up a category to win the Women’s Junior 17 category. Martha and Amelia combined forces to win the Women’s Junior 16 double sculls category as well.
St Ives had also laid on a special ‘Primary’ category for ladies who had never competed before. SRC ladies squad members Poppy Grosch and Jackie Lloyd won two races in this category to claim their first pots and the sixth victory for SRC on the day.
Other members competing were Nell Belcher, Freya Evans, Helena Griffiths, Byron Bullen, Sam McLoughlin, Owen Moriarty and Henry Tullin from the juniors and Teresa Moriarty, Tracy Muir, Jeremy Milbank and Sean Moriarty from the adult squad. There were strong performances and close finishes for some of these members too.
Sean Moriarty raced in a single scull at a regatta for the first time, then competed with wife Teresa as they doubled up for the first time and pushed an experienced Mixed Masters E double scull from Peterborough City all the way to the line.
On the same weekend, Jen Titterington competed with her regular doubles partner from Ipswich Rowing Club, Bev Goodchild, at Henley Women’s Regatta. The regatta is held over three days, over a distance of 1500 meteres, on the Henley Royal Regatta course.
On the Friday morning, all 38 of the competitors in their event, Aspirational Double Sculls, completed a time trial. The fastest 16 crews from this race went through to the heats on Friday afternoon, where the Ipswich/Sudbury crew beat Cantabrigian in a time of 5:59.
On the Saturday they raced against a Mexican crew from ‘Club Espana’. This was a much closer race, but the IPS/SRC crew came from behind to win by 3 1/2 lengths in a time of 5:38.
On Sunday morning they competed in a semi-final against opposition from Nottingham RC. This was again a much closer race, and very hard fought, but the Ipswich/Sudbury crew eventually won by 1/2 length, in a time of 5:27.
Sadly, in the final that afternoon, the Suffolk pairing were beaten by a crew from the Netherlands, from KSRV Njord.
Although they didn’t quite get the win they were aiming for, competing in a final at Henley Women’s Regatta is a tremendous achievement, and the crew were both keen to thank everybody who had helped them during such a successful season.