At 6:15 a.m. on Sunday morning, a bleary-eyed and sleep-deprived W1 crew huddled for warmth in the Murray Edwards car park, eager to get on the road to Bedford for their third and fourth races of the weekend. Still physically and emotionally drained by the previous day’s regatta, we were relatively subdued on the journey, most of us sleeping while Laurane broke various speeding laws…
Once we had collected our race numbers and woken up sufficiently to go in search of our trailer, we began to get excited for what was for most of the crew their first off-Cam race! Seeing crews and boats of all shapes, ages, and sizes made for an interesting day of people-watching, and facing the challenge of a very unstable pontoon made for some pre-race entertainment that set the tone for the rest of a pretty great day.
Rowing on a new course was exciting and, despite the fact that two kilometres is a tough distance, the calm conditions and our focus meant that we managed to maintain poise and composure throughout the race, making it seem like a breeze compared to our struggles in the regatta of the previous day. Even the second time around, when people were starting to feel cold and a bit tired, we made sure to push hard and finish strong as an incredibly intimidating and impressive men’s four ended up overtaking us at the end of the course. Overall, we were proud of our progress over the term as a relatively inexperienced crew, and everyone was in good spirits as we headed over to Nando’s for lunch.
The day was full of new in-jokes and bonding, which have slowly begun to translate to how we work as a crew, and we are all very excited for Bumps and whatever comes after that!
Emily Busvine, Stroke