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 Cardiff Bay over 1500mtrs - 12 Maidenhead athletes were selected to compete for England at this years Home International match held in Cardiff. This resulted in a perfect end to a very tough and challanging season for the High Performance Group of boys and girls at Maidenhead. A big thank you to the entire support team at Maidenhead that covers managing entries, driving trailers, parents support and of course the hard work put in by the athletes and the encouragement given by all the coaches at Maidenhead and the support of the club from the top down.
 Mens Junior Coxless Four. (Race 3)
First of the 3 Maidenhead crews up to compete were the mens coxless four of George Poynter, Alex Ryde. Adam Lilley and Robert Ashburner stroke. This four had won the Gold medal at National champs the week before by a close margin of 1.2 seconds from the Welsh selected crew. So a hard fought race was expected. Going off the strat there was little between all four crews and in the first 500mtrs Ireland and the Welsh crew both seemed to steer into the England. The Irish crew had lost its steering so stopped rowing and the Maidenhead crew representing England raced on against the Welsh and Scottish crews. Scotland seemed to slip away after the other 3 crews came together and racing to the line England and Wales could not catch the Scottish crew who finished 14 seconds ahead of the Welsh crew with England finishing 3 seconds behind the Welsh crew. Despite the clash of boats which benefitted the Scottish crew it was still a great achievement to have a 100% Maidenhead crew representing England at this level. Well done to coaches Tom Jost, John Truswell and Rob Davies.
 Womens Junior Double Sculls (Race 17)
Second Maidenhead crew up to compete for England were the junior womens double scullers of Sophie Delaney and Ally Brooks in their last day of International racing at junior level. This experienced crew of junior internationals were expecting to be pushed by the crew from Ireland. Moving quickly out of the blocks they showed ahead and at 500mtrs had a clear lead of 2 lengths over the chasing pack. Drawing away with every stroke they crossed the line in first place to win the event 7.8seconds ahead of Scotland who finished 6 seconds ahead of Wales with Ireland in 4th place.
Women Junior eight (Race 27 moved to race 35)
Third Maidenhead crew was the junior womens eight with one athlete on board from Rob Roy RC. This crew (Sophie Wedlake, Aimee Campbell, Aimee Broadbent, Alicia Parker(Rob Roy), Sophie Delaney, Alice Ancora, Francesca Lovely, Ally Brooks stroke and Zoe Broadbent cox) did exceptionally well for a club crew with only one non Maidenhead athlete on board. This final race was scheduled to race at 3:50pm so Maidenhead representing England carried out there normal race warm up and crew build up for this race. After spending 40 minutes warming up the crew were not pleased to discover that the race had suddenly been put back to the last race of the day. The second warm up run was difficult to emulate the earlier build up. This young crew with 2 J16’s on board blasted out of the blocks and at the first 500m mark they were a few feet down on Ireland with Scotland and Wales fighting for 3rd and 4th positions a length behind. During the middle 500m to the 1000mtr mark England took the lead and opened up a ½ length lead over Ireland.  Racing neck and neck to the finish line England were just caught in the last 100mtrs and had to settle for a well earned 2nd place just 2 seconds behind Ireland and 8secs and 9secs ahead of Scotland and Wales. The Irish crew is believed to have had some Coupe athletes on board so this was an excellent result for a club crew to come so close to winning this sought after event.
Other Maidenhead club members who competed at the Home International event included.
Former Maidenhead junior squad member - Laurian Pepper who won Womens lightweight coxless pairs in style beating the crew that won Gold at National Champs for Scotland.
Former Maidenhead junior squad member Louise Entwistle won both the womens coxless fours and the womens eights events for England by convincing 7 second margins.
Former Maidenhead junior squad member David Jones competing for Wales fought really hard in an exciting single race to finish just 0.5seconds behind England.
This was a good day to see Maidenhead athletes competing against some of the best competitors in the UK. |
