I think it’s safe to say W3 felt surprised and scared to have made it onto Bumps – a new experience for us all!
After the success of our races this term in the Newnham Short Course and naturally the Getting On Race there was a certain expectation amongst us for our first ever Bumps.
We were racing in fourth place in our division: Lucy/Hughes, Maggie and Clare in front, Jesus and Queens behind. As we were lining up the tension was rising; we had only practised Bumps starts that morning and the weather seemed to be (quite literally) turning against us, as the wind became fiercer.
We heard the cannons sound and suddenly it was the final countdown and then we were off! Jesus seemed to be gaining on us at first, but caught a crab and the rest of the way were fending off Queens for as long as possible before they were inevitably bumped. So the pressure was off in that respect…. However with continuing calls from Emily and Païvi that we were approaching Clare quite quickly we put everything we had into our strokes. Unfortunately Maggie had crashed into a tree allowing for Clare to bump them too, leaving only us in the race to row over.
It was an exciting but terrifying first experience of Bumps. Hopefully we’ll catch up to Maggie tomorrow.
Clara Percival, stroke