The eight continued on the road river to the Women’s Eights Head by racing at their home event, the Head of the Trent. The aim was to have a solid race that we could then step up from on the Tideway. After an evening the night before all baking cakes for the club to sell, the crew turned up early for a pre-paddle and then stayed around to support the Nottingham crews racing in the earlier divisions. In the third division, with Rob Lawson coxing, the girls recorded an emphatic win, beating the second placed women’s eight by over 40 seconds, and once again won the Robin Haslam trophy for the fastest women’s crew of the day.

Saturday 9^th March was the big race, where the crew of Katie Bartlett, Ellie Whittle, Lindsay Marshall, Sarah Bonar, Laura Wheeler, Catherine Lineker, Fiona Bassett and Nikki Spencer, coxed by Vicky Atkins and coached by Dez Atkins and Julie Edwards took to the water to race against 320 other women’s eights. Fi, Sarah and Katie are all on the GB Rowing Team Start programme, whilst the others are members of the High Performance Group. Led by the young guns in the stern, backed up by the big guns in the middle and with bow pair ‘keeping the bows out the water’ the crew put together a great race, overtaking the Zurich crew which finished second last year during the first half of the race, and then continuing that momentum over the second half to pull away from chasing Wallingford and setting us up well for the finish. The Tideway was kind and remained flat and calm, allowing for crews to race to their full potential.

The crew came 6^th overall, winning the Provincial Pennant and also breaking the Provincial course record by 15 seconds. This now means that the current squad members hold a course record at the Fours Head, eights Head and Women’s Henley, with Catherine being the proud owner of all three!

Thank you must to Boston Rowing Club for allowing us to use their eight and to Loughborough Students 

Rowing for making that possible. 

Next up – training camp and hopefully some sun!