Boat Club

The Under 15 team did not come into their best form until the first home match — two weeks before the end of term! Prior to that a punishing schedule of away fixtures had enabled our players to develop their all-round game by playing on a variety of surfaces, with mixed results. Some interesting bounces on grass courts at Scarborough (in a sea-fret) and Pocklington were especially challenging. This was all good experience, but the lads played with much more confidence and competitiveness when they had home advantage. In the match against Barnard Castle they put it all together for a powerful win, with everybody playing well. This showed how much progress had been made over the term.

Team:

J. Swallow, R. Pipes, D. Ellis, A. Pickard, S. Berry, P. Watson.

Also played:

J. Fieldsend, S. Khanna, T. Dunn, A. Martin.

Results:

Opponents Scarborough College Pocklington School Ampleforth College Ashville College Durham School Barnard Castle School Venue A A A A A H For 9 3.5 1.5 3.5 5.5 8 AGS 0 5.5 7.5 5.5 3.5 1 D. S.

W/D/L W L L L W W Newman

BOAT CLUB

The Head Season

We enjoyed a successful season this winter with continual improvement and some fine racing. St. Peter's Boat Club has been represented at eight Head races (including two on the Tideway) and has had nine wins in Junior, Novice and Senior III events.

A lot of the basic training and technique work was done in the Christmas Term when we had four crews on the river. Peterswalk '89 fitted nicely into our distance training and two fours and a sculling boat completed the distance from Boroughbridge to York.

Our first race of the season was the Ancholme Head in October which was run over three miles of the straightest river possible. With a stiff tail wind, times were fast. The Boys' Senior III crew came second whilst the girls' Novice four were the fastest girls' crew in a recordbreaking time.

Our next event was a slight contrast. For the first time in several years St. Peter's Boat Club raced on the Tideway in the Head of the River Fours Race. This is a 4W mile race over the Boat Race course (but in the other direction) with 500 crews taking part. (Our girls, starting number 499, had to be patient!) The boys came 304th overall and the girls 402nd, which made them a very respectable 4th in the Women's Novice Division.

On the next day they raced in the Watney Fours, a shorter Head race run from Hammersmith to Chiswick, and the girls (Jo King, Vicki Inness, Marianne Waggott, Judith Hopton and cox, Lindsay Daniel) managed to win their event.

In the York Small Boats Head we raced four crews, two of which did the course twice in different events. The Junior four did well to come 38th out of the 279 crews overall and the girls (crew as before) were the fastest of the twenty Women's Novice fours.

The Yorkshire Junior League ran a Head Race and the girls' crew (as above) was again successful, as were the first boys four (Andy Newell, Chris Rowland, Mark Pyrah, John Davidson and cox, Steve Harryman).

Towards the end of the Christmas Term two crews went and raced on the Tyne in the Rutherford Head. Conditions were beautiful and the senior boys crew (as above) raced well to come second in the Senior III class.

In the Spring Term we were badly hit (as was almost every other racing club in the country) by floods. Joshua Rowe, an Australian student who has just joined us for two terms, was used to rowing in the sun and could not believe our weather. The rain went on for weeks and drove us to any available patch of dry ground for landtraining. Gary "mud-bath" Lawrence did a wonderful job and drove the rowers to new depths of suffering from which they emerged fitter.

At half-term we had a St. Peter's crew in the Longship racing which is part of the Viking Festival. The event was rowed in replica Viking boats in fancy dress and really was quite spectacular. We met with no great success but we will practice back-stops paddling with pencil blades before next year's attempt!

More serious racing was resumed with a trip to Nottingham to row in the Head of the Trent. Conditions on the river were difficult but two of the St. Peter's crews coped very well. The Women's Novice four (crew as before) won their event, beating the other eleven crews and the Men's Novice four (Roger Sangwin, John Davidson, Andy Newell and James Mee) did the same in their event, thirty-four seconds faster than any of the other fourteen Novice crews. It was wet and cold and Steve Harryman fully deserved two "pots" for coxing in both divisions. At the time these wins counted as Novice wins and these two crews were, therefore, now Senior III. (The A.R.A. later revoked this ruling and the boys were able to return to Novice status.)

We were then back to home water for the Yorkshire Head and entered six crews. The girls (crew as before) were not daunted by their new status and won at Senior III level. The Junior four (Mark Pyrah, Chris Rowland, Joshua Rowe, Simon Bowen and cox, Alex Bailes) raced well and won their event whilst the newly promoted Senior III boys' crew only lost by a few seconds. We had three Novice crews entered with a healthy amount of inter-crew rivalry. The fastest crew on the day was the fifth year crew (Jeremy Doncaster, Chris Lloyd, Ben Miller, Tim Cordier and cox, John Muir) who showed a lot of fight and determination and put up a very good performance in some of our older equipment.

There are times when even teachers and coaches are absolutely dumbstruck. It was one of the last rowing sessions of the Easter Term, I was feeling hassled (nothing new) and about to counter some comments about our boats with the usual, "take it or leave it, it's all we have..." argument when Joshua's words, ".... so I've had a word with my father and we thought we'd buy you a new one'' filtered through to my not very receptive brain. He was talking about buying a new four, on the condition that it was delivered for the beginning of the Summer Term. I still do not know how to thank someone for such a tremendously generous offer. It really does not happen very often! The challenge was then to find a boat-builder that could produce the goods to this time-scale. The boat that arrived in the first week of the Summer Term is a beautiful wooden Empacher shell, imported from Germany and fitted out by Andrew Sims. It's called "Bungarra" which is something fast and Australian! She will be a great asset to the Club for many years.

The Summer Term has been hectic. We have raced most weekends, travelling further than we have in recent years and entering some regattas for the first time. The rowers that we have travelled away with have worked hard, raced well and been, generally, very goodhumoured and helpful. This summer's regatta crews have set standards (not only on the water) that those coming up through the Boat Club will have to work hard to maintain. Let me summarise our regatta season.

York Spring Regatta

York Spring fell on a beautiful sunny day. (One of those days when finding volunteers for stake-boat duty is no problem!) We entered eight crews including, for the first time in many years, an eight (for which we borrowed from Leeds University). Of the six events we entered we reached the final in every one of them. However, there were some good finalists around, from City of Cambridge in particular, and it was only the Girls' Senior III crew (Jo King, Vicki Inness, Marianne Waggott, Judith Hopton and cox, Lindsay Daniel) who managed to win their final.

Nottingham City Regatta

We then travelled south for a taste of multi-lane racing and some stiffer opposition. There was a breeze and Holme Pierrepont was its lively self. We faced four fours and an eight. The Novice four, one of the Senior III fours and the Women's Senior III four all made their finals, he girls' crew winning their semi-final very convincingly. At the end of the day the best result was a third place in the final by our Novice four.

Bradford Spring Regatta

Eight crews were entered in all. Three crews made it through to the semi-final and then went out. The Women's Novice four and the Junior 16 four lost in their finals. Our only triumph of the day was our Mixed four. (There were comments passed that the boys had finally discovered how to win.... row with the girls!).

Durham Invitation Regatta

It was St. Peter's turn to travel up to Durham for this annual regatta. It gave our novice rowers a good chance to race on a different bit of river. Although one boys' crew and one girls' crew reached the finals, Durham School won overall.

Northwich Regatta

Two crews were keen enough to pursue their "Novice Pots" even through half-term and, this time, we went west. The fifth year crew (Alistair Birch, Stuart Clark, Charlie Barlow and Tim Cordier) illustrated that with good technique you can beat crews that are bigger and probably stronger. They raced very well and we were all sorry to see them lose in the final.

Peterborough Regatta

Peterborough gave us another chance for multi-lane rowing. Our two Novice fours each had two races but neither of them made the final.

Berwick Regatta

Our Sixth Form Novice crew had been racing weekend after weekend. They had trained hard and were looking good together but "Novice Pots" were proving to be a very illusive commodity. Berwick was going to be their day. However, in the semi-finals they were drawn against a crew whose equipment failed and our boys were left sitting on the start for a long time. They were cold and stiff when they eventually raced against a crew whose adrenalin was pumping and they lost by a canvas. Their opposition went on to win the final convincingly.

Agecroft Regatta

Both our Senior II four and our Novice four made the finals of their respective events. The Novice crew lost to some very large men from Liverpool whilst our Senior II crew succeeded in being disqualified whilst they were up, off the start.

York Summer Regatta

Two eights, six fours and a sculler raced. Three of the crews (the boys' Senior III four, girls' Senior III four and girls' Junior eight) lost in the final. The York City Rowing Club and St. Peter's composite Senior II eight won their final against Manchester University and the Novice four that had been plagued by bad luck eventually got everything right and won their "Novice Pots". The Senior II eight was John Ward (Y.C.R.C.), Jamie Macleod (Y.C.R.C), David Coverdale (Y.C.R.C), Joshua Rowe (S.P.S.B.C.), Paul Richardson (Y.C.R.C.), Paul Baron (Y.C.R.C.), Mark Pyrah (S.P.S.B.C), Chris Rowland (S.P.S.B.C.) and Celia Paris (Y.C.R.C.) and the Novice four was Joby Taylor, James Butler, Jeremy Doncaster (substitute for Ben Taylor), James Hague and Damien Lipman.