Stratford upon Avon Boat Club made the trip to local club Worcester for the long distance spring head on Saturday 18th February. The event, which is raced over one of the longest provincial courses in the country at 6km, was held in overcast but otherwise good rowing conditions.
The event, which is restricted to fours and eights, attracted a high quality field in all disciplines from across the Midlands and the South West.
Raced over two divisions, the morning division saw crews from Stratford’s sister club King Edwards School racing in the Men’s J18 coxed four and Women’s IM3 coxed four events with the men recording a very good event win in a time of 22 minutes and 31 seconds.
Stratford Masters then followed rowing in a combined crew with Bridgnorth Rowing Club in the highly contested Masters C/D age category event against seven entries from across the region and recorded a nail biting win over highly fancied Monmouth by a mere two seconds in a time of 19 minutes and 48 seconds to win the event. In the afternoon Stratford’s Masters again took to the water with two crews battling it out in Masters C/D and E/F age category events in coxed fours.
The Stratford Masters C/D crew straight from racing in the successful winning eight in the morning division kept up the winning streak with a comprehensive win over Bridgnorth Rowing club in a time of 21 minutes and 33 seconds. Despite a polished performance, the Stratford Masters E/F crew were denied a chance of making it a clean sweep of event wins by a high quality Monmouth crew ultimately finishing in third place in a time of 23 minutes and 29 seconds.
Said Tom Doherty, Masters Vice Captain, “It was great to see two masters fours in highly competitive racing, allied to a very positive result with our friends from Bridgnorth as we continue training for the national eights competition in London in March.”
See also Stratford Herald online http://www.stratford-herald.com/66609-stratford-masters-imp… and p15 and Stratford Obsever p31 & online https://stratfordobserver.co.uk/…/stratfords-masters-progre…