It feels like we haven't stopped since Brit Champs in October! We have had a race every other week since then, so things have been a little busy.

First off, 2 weeks after the Autumn Head we had the first set of GB trials. This is a gruelling weekend, with a 2k erg on the Saturday, and then if you make the cut-off time, you are entered into a 5km head race on the Sunday. The squad got off to an excellent start, with Catherine and Kirstie both making the time, with Kirstie getting a massive PB and going under 7 minutes for the first time and placing 15th. Laura topped off the heavyweight racing with a PB as well. Nikki raced next in the lightweights, falling just short of her PB but making the cut-off comfortably. Yaz continued with her recent form with a PB and a 4th place finish (2nd U23). Laura Wheeler is still recovering from her back injury, and had a medical exemption from this trial.

Day 2 dawned with an early drive back to Boston. We could not have asked for better water conditions, with almost flat calm conditions. Kirstie raced in the heavyweight division first, having an excellent row to come home in 27th place, in an event won by Jess Leyden, the current junior singles World Champion. Unfortunately Catherine was unable to race due to illness. In the lightweight division, Nikki improved on her ranking from the erg to finish in 7th place, with Yaz claiming 10th position. The winner of the lightweight event, Charlotte Taylor, produced the fastest women's time of the day.

The squad then had a quick transition into crew boats for the Fours Head of the River Race. We were involved in 2 quads, an elite quad of Nikki, Laura, Kirstie and Lindsay raced for time only after having to make more than 50% substitutions from the initial entry. Unfortunately, due to a blade breaking just before Hammersmith Bridge, the crew did not achieve the race they were hoping for, but did benefit from some solid power training, after finishing the race with just 3 rowing (and managing to hold off some crews!) Catherine was joined by Start athletes Sarah Bonar and Kyra Edwards as well as Anna Thornton in an IM1 4x, which had a brilliant race, and rowed home with a comprehensive 12 second victory over their opposition, and placing 5th women's quad overall. This is the second time Catherine has won at the Fours Head, and the 3rd time the squad has won a pennant at this prestigious event.

Having felt like we had only just left Boston, we returned on Saturday 14th December for the second GB assessment. This trial was just the 5km water test, with the inclusion of the squad athletes that raced at the World Championships, resulting in a very high quality field. The U23 athletes were not required to attend this assessment, so Catherine and Nikki were the only 2 athletes to race, and were greeted with a massive headwind for the final 3km of the race. Catherine came 27th in a race won by Fran Houghton, with Nikki improving on her previous result, coming 6th, in a race won by Imogen Walsh, who beat Olympic Champion Kat Copeland. As a result of their performance at trials, Kirstie and Yaz have been invited to a training week in Caversham this week.

The squad now get a small break from racing, and a chance to recharge a little over Christmas, before a busy few months at the start of 2014, with WEHoRR, more trials and maybe a few more races thrown in.

Happy Christmas!

After closely monitoring the river conditions for the week leading up to the Autumn Head, and listening to the high winds on Saturday night, more than a few people were concerned the race wasn't going to go ahead. Luckily Sunday dawned brighter and calmer than forecast, and despite it taking approximately 2 years to get up to the pipe, the Autumn Head went off as planned, and on time!

The squad were racing in their singles in the first division, resulting in a starting order where we chased each other down the course. Despite some pre-race reconnaissance of the course, the wind and stream seemed to have other ideas, with some of us taking some creative racing lines. With two weeks left to go before trials, this race came at the end of a tough training block, and provided the perfect practice for the 5km water trial.

The squad came away with 2 wins, Yaz won Senior singles, and Laura won IM2 singles with Kirstie coming second in the same category. Nikki came second in Elite singles, behind Junior World Champion Jess Leyden from Hollingworth lake, followed by Start athlete Katie Bartlett, then Catherine in 4th and Lindsay in 5th. Abby came 3rd and Caitlin 5th in IM3 singles. Whilst the rest of the group enjoyed a nice cup of tea and some cake, Laura headed back out onto the water after a late call up into an IM2 quad which came second in their category over the shorter course in division 2. The girls then tried their hand at start marshalling, which is more difficult than it looks when you can't see half the crews and/or their race numbers, but I think everyone managed to get off in the right order!

Congratulations to anyone that managed to make it up to the start line - it's great to see so many people sculling up to race, and thanks to everyone that helped make the day go so smoothly, from the race organisers, marshals and safety team, to everyone that made cakes and manned the food stall.

A very overdue blog post - it's been a busy week!

The 19th and 20th October saw the British Championships being brought to the National Water Sports Centre in Nottingham. This is the first time that the event has been held at this time of year, in the format that was trialled at the Diamond Jubilee in 2012; with doubles and fours racing on the Saturday, and quads and eights racing on the Sunday. Heavyweights, lightweights, U23 and U19 all raced together, with medals awarded to the top 3, and pennants to the winners of the sub categories. All athletes wishing to represent GB in the summer were required to race at least one day, whilst anyone on funding had to race both days, ensuring that racing was of a very high standard at the top end. Each day starts with time trials to allocate which semi-final you were to race, with the top 12 going to the A/B semis, 13-24 to the C/D semis and so on. This format means that you are guaranteed close racing whatever your standard, as you are divided into groups of similar speeds. It also means that you are guaranteed 3 races, and come away with a final ranking, whether that be 1st or 31st.

The squad had 2 doubles entered on the Saturday, with Yaz and Nikki racing as a lightweight double, and Kirstie and Laura C racing in the heavyweight double. The time trial is raced over 1900m, and knowing this could decide how your day is going to pan out, with the threat of missing a higher semi final by a small margin hanging over you, it definitely wakes you up! After a tense wait, the light double were to race in the C/D semi, whilst the heavy double were in the G/H semis. In the C/D semi the light double had a close fight with two U23 bronze medallists, who just pipped them to the line, but ensured a close race for the C final. The heavy double had an excellent semi-final where the top 3 boats almost crossed the line together, and they ensured their place in the G final, where in a strengthening cross head they rowed a hard race and left everything out on the water. In the C final, the light double couldn't match the strength of the heavyweights in their final off the start, but slowly clawed their way back through the field, pushing past the Leander C boat and the U23 lightweights, and finished second - giving a finishing position of 14th, in an event won by VML and Fran Houghton, and 4th lightweight boat overall.

On day 2 the heavy quad of Cathers, with Start athletes Katie, Sarah and Beth, came out to play, whilst Nikki joined fellow lightweights from MAA and Putney Town RC in a composite quad. Both boats made it through to the A final, and were drawn in adjacent lanes. The favourites from Tees lead from start to finish, whilst Wallingford pushed out into second, leaving the Nottingham and Mortlake quads to fight for third. Through every timing marker the quads were level, with both crews being able to hear and respond to the other boats calls. At 250m to go the composite had their noses in front, but in a final move to the line, the Nottingham quad managed to push through and take a hard earned bronze medal.

                                                          Photo by Naomi Baker Sports Photography

Overall the weekend was a great success, it is a well organised event with close racing. The only thing missing were a few more spectators! There has been a lot of debate about the format of this event as a 'true National Championships', with nrod.wordpress.com summing up opinions well if you are interested.

The squad have a busy few weeks up to Christmas, racing on the 3rd November at the Small Boats Head, followed by GB trials a fortnight later, then 4s head 2 weeks after that, and then trials again 2 weeks after that.

A little snapshot of some of things the squad got up to last season. Worth watching!

If viewing on a mobile you might need to go to the video via youtube:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4pOhORVZY6s&feature=youtu.be

A warm, flat lake produced some fast times and good racing for the 51st Home International Regatta held at Holme Pierrepont on Saturday. This is an annual match between England, Ireland, Scotland and Wales, with countries taking it in turns to host the event in their country.

Pippa raced first in her single, finishing off the season with an excellent win against some fast opposition in a time of 7.53. Next down the course was Nikki racing in a lightweight pair with Anastasia from Mortlake Anglian and Alpha BC. They were closely tracked down the course by defending winners from Wales, but held off a strong finish from the Welsh pair to win. Nikki then joined fellow lightweights Fran, Anna and Charlie from MAA and Putney Town to race in the openweight quads. The quad had a strong row to win comfortably, in a time of 6.51.

This brings an end to a lucrative 2013 season for the squad. Bring on 2014!

Notable wins and achievements for the 2012/13 season include:

Diamond Jubilee Regatta - Silver in women's fours
                                         - bronze in women's quads (composite)
Fours Head of the River  - Win in senior 4s (record time)
Eights Head of the River Race - Winners of the provincial pennant, 6th place overall (record time)
Nottingham City Regatta - Women's lightweight singles 1st and 2nd
                                         - Women's heavyweight singles 1st, 2nd and 3rd
Met Regatta - Winner IM2 singles
                     - Winners IM1 quads
Henley Women's Regatta - Winners senior quads, senior single, senior lightweight single
Henley Royal Regatta - A quad and 3 singles racing
Home International Regatta - wins in W1x, WLwt2- and W4x for England.

Laura Wheeler has been invited to train full time with the squad at their base in Caversham.
Alumni Vicki Meyer-Laker won the W2x World Cup series. Monica and Tina have both been competing in the W4x at this seasons World Cups.