The Ross Juniors travelled with seniors to Evesham Regatta on April 30th and Sunday 1st May. The Saturday course was over 1000m against the stream and posed a significant test for any crew. The winter training and the quality of Easter Camp preparation paid dividends with the Squad picking up two wins and two very creditable second places.
In the women's J14 double Jess and Catrin rowed powerfully to win a tight final. The J14 quad of Johan, Henry, George and Dale, coxed by Rhodri, won convincingly. In the women's J14 and J15 quads, despite a lot of effort and quality performance, were narrowly beaten. On Sunday most of the Junior Academy competitive squad took part in the sprint event over 500 meters. The competition was huge and Ross crews had to work hard to reach their respective finals.
The Junior Academy Squad picked up an incredible ten wins, starting with the Boys J15 coxed quads with Will, Johan, Morgan, Will, coxed again by Rhodri. This was swiftly followed by a win for Skye in the WJ13 single. Gabby was the next notable victory. She won her semi final over her Hinksey (Oxford) opposition in convincing style and then sculled determinedly to win her final.
The women's J15 coxed quad of Effie, Charlie, Caitlin and Hazel, coxed by Livi, produced some fine powerful sculling to beat strong opposition from Staines in the semi final and Bristol in the final. Ross Junior Academy continued to dominate the women's quads events and it was the turn of the WJ12 (Izzy, Adrienne, Fran and Anna, coxed by Lucy Jones) and WJ13's (Pippa, Emily, Alice and Christina, with Izzy coxing) to both win in convincing style.
Back in single sculls, Ross's quality of sculling was demonstrated by Scarlett winning her WJ12 final over Upper Thames and in the boys J12 singles Tom beat his doubles partner Harry in a very close final. Earlier in the day Tom and Harry had won their J12 double event in a straight final. The final wins of the day came in the Boys J15 doubles and J14 quads. In the double Johan and Will rowed majestically to beat stiff opposition. In the J14 quads, George, Henry, Dale and Nick, coxed by Rhodri, beat strong opposition from Hinksey sculling school.
Junior captain Mark Scott commented: "I want to thank all of the squad who competed at Evesham Regatta. They all put in a huge amount of effort and whatever the result of their particular event I think they all deserve an enormous amount of praise for the way they represented the club and themselves at the regatta. I thought the way they supported each other and cheered all the other Ross RC crews was brilliant. A big thanks too to all of the parents who carried boats and blades back and forth all day and a huge thanks to Mandy for her usual magnificent organisation and telling us all where to be and when and to Tim and Mike for getting the boats there and back again."
The ladies section entered two crews on the Saturday over the 1000m course; women's IM2 2 double sculls of Holly Campbell and Geraldine Calcraft, and the women's veteran c four consisting of Rowena Pollock, Dawn Evans, Annie Williams and Nicky Wild and coxed by Emily Preece, and one crew on Sunday over the 500m course; women's IM3 double sculls of Bethan Hunter and Sally Pettipher.
On the Saturday the IM2 double had a convincing win in their first race against Evesham, steering well and keeping a good rhythm up against a strong head wind which all competitors faced and which made racing very difficult. They unfortunately lost in the final to a second Evesham crew but noting that they rowed up a higher status, full credit should be given for their strength and determination in competing well and putting up two very fine performances.
The women's four competed in a straight final against a crew from Bedford. The ladies managed to keep the length and technique together throughout the race and pulled away from their opponents in the first 500m of the course, winning by a length and a quarter in a very tidy row. Praise goes especially to the cox Emily Preece for steering such a controlled and tight line on the whole course.
On Sunday the IM3 double competed against a Warwick crew in their very first race together. The ladies got off to a good start and rowed well together keeping the length and timing; despite slight steering problems accentuated by a cross wind they held it all together incredibly well but unfortunately lost to a more crew. Lastly, on Sunday to mark the royal wedding weekend, Evesham laid on special mixed four rowing events to which Ross entered a mixed crew of Rowena Pollock, Richard Jennison, Mike Phillips and Dawn Evans coxed by Skye Jenkins at IM3 level. All crews had to dress up in their finery, the men in bow ties and corsages and the ladies in tiaras. In the spirit of the competition Ross had very commendable rows against the two Evesham crews noting that they had only had two previous outings beforehand together, losing out to the younger of the Evesham crews but beating the other convincingly – albeit aided by the loss of steering on their opponents' boat.
Ross Men – The recently formed Masters "C" (average age over 43) coxed four of Andrew Leeman, Mike Phillips, Richard Jennison and Tim Crossman coxed by Skye Jenkins came to Evesham with some trepidation as Sunday's 500 metre sprint was to be their first competitive event and they were to row in an open IM3 class rather than a veteran class of their peers. In the event however, all fears were put aside as they overhauled a younger crew from Hereford to win their first final by just three feet. So their dedication to training since forming in January and coaching from Jane Delicata have reaped its first reward and bodes well for the future. Earlier in the weekend, the men's Masters "D" coxed four of Jeremy Picton-Turbervill, Graham Watling, Paul Brodholt and Dave Sykes coxed by Lucy Jones won their heat but lost to Hereford in the final of Saturday's 1,000 metre race by two seconds. Success was to come on Sunday, however, when they won their sprint race against a crew from Llandaff - making two wins over the weekend for the Men's Senior Squad.