A picture says a thousand words...
It was a dark and snowy start to the day for the Junior's shot at the Head of the Fish. Our Master's program had a great Saturday and the challenge was clearly laid out to the juniors to improve on their performance. Our team dinner the night before at Lillian's in downtown Saratoga, set the tone and was the perfect opportunity to send Coach Chris off on a high note and thank him for his contributions and dedication to the jr. program this season.
Matt P., Connor, Josh, Chloe and Julia I. bundled into the suburban in the pitch dark and 25 degree temperature in order to make the first races of the day, which for us specifically was the boy's 2- of Matt and Connor. They had only a couple of practice days in the pair and I honestly had no idea what to expect from them. I encouraged them to harness their brute strength and to rely more on grace... not sure what they did, but it worked... our first Fish Head of the day! Our Singles entries all did as expected, coming around middle of the pack, Josh has not trained for the event, Chloe was seriously outsized and Julia I. was only just getting back into rowing, so I was pleased with all their efforts.
Claire Hughe's army had a fantastic breakfast waiting the hungry horde as they too stepped off the team buses, bleary eyed and not exactly sure what winterland they had been transported to and why on earth they were even contemplating rowing in these temperatures. But as Napoleon said, an army marches on its stomach, and with our team well nourished and now invigorated it was a frenetic pace to keep the boats rigged and rolling out to meet the race schedule. We launched 16 boats in the first 75 minutes... I will say that is a record for me!
And row the kids did, with excellent results. The boys N8+ and Varsity Girl's 8+'s were the first big boats of the day. The boy's 9th place out of 25 boats was an excellent showing especially given just how raw many of our novices are. The girls varsity boats did tremendously, the 2V8+ just missed out on a medal with a brilliant 4th place beating highly fancied crews Niskayuna and St. Catherines. Our 1V8+ was out to prove themselves following the HOCR incident, and boy did they - second place, beating many of the teams that "beat them" at HOCR, including beating Albany by 14 seconds who had claimed 14th at HOCR.
Up next was our girls novice 4x who claimed an amazing 7th out of 17.... amazing because they got to practice sculling twice before their race! Well done girls.
Our boy's doubles were up next, with the open weight claiming 7/27 and the ltwt combination of Josh and Ian claiming silver behind the highly fancied GMS boys. It should be remembered that Josh had just got off the water from his singles race too!
The next time I go to a casino, I'm headed to the roulette table and betting 7's, because yet agin it was 7th place for both the boy's varsity ltwt 4+ and 1V4+ entries, both well at the top of the field of entries.
And our novice 4+ result of 12/31 entries was also very respectable.
Up next were the girl's 4x entries, where despite the fact that we have not trained much in sculling boats, we considered ourselves in the medal hunt. Another Fish Head - well done our girl's 4x for beating some really fast teams. Our 2nd 4x had some really bad luck getting tangled in to some slow moving boats that refused to yield and had to settle for 10/21 knowing they had a much better placing in them.
Both our boy's V8+s finished right in the middle of the pack. Not surprising as neither boat was at full strength and many of the rowers were on their second race of the day. they looked great coming down the course and I will be very interested to see how they do at the Riverfront in stronger line-ups and fresher legs.
Our boys JV8+ racing as 3V8+ won the bronze medal - well done guys. You are on a tear this season, your hard work and discipline is paying off in spades.
Our boy's 4x's were up next and again we were just pipped out of 1st by GMS and had to be satisfied with a silver medal... will be interesting to see what we can accomplish with some training in the 4x's, lots to be excited about.
The Varsity doubles racing provided exciting racing, with middle of the field results for the open weights (who have never practiced together) and the closest race of the regatta for the lightweights. Originally the results showed that the top 4 places were separated by just 1.7 seconds! Our two crews claimed 2nd (Nina and Mariah) and 4th (Katie and MaryGail). There was a lot of confusion with that race, with protests galore and all of a sudden first place was given to another crew altogether with an unlikely 20 second margin..... hmmm. Next time girls!
As the day wound down, our girls 4+, boys n4x, and mixed 8+, were all exhausted from previous racing and hot seating to get back for their next race with no time for rest in between, as such their middle to back of the pack results were not surprising, hopefully they enjoyed the race experiences.
A special shout out to our girl's novice 2x who without any practice (bad conditions in the week prior), battled their way up to the start and then got excluded for not being able to hold their course. They came rowing gamely down the course and when they pulled in were able to smile and be philosophical about the experience.
All in all it was a fabulous outing to Saratoga. The weather broke to a stunning day and the kids were on their best behavior. Chris Chase (regatta director)n summarized PCRA's accomplishments as better than the entire accumulation of previous years entries! Well done everyone.
A huge amount of effort goes into the planning and running of an event like this, I would like to thank my coaching staff for all their efforts, especially Brendan who was tied up Friday through Monday and drove a boat trailer for the first time. A big shout out too, to the chaperones (especially Bud Daley), and to Jean, Amy, Robin and Claire for their extraordinary efforts.
