It has been a busy few weeks, with things only just beginning to settle back down. The beginning of the month saw our senior athletes head of to the first GB assessment weekend. The first day started well, with PBs coming from Rosie Wilkins, Caitlin and Kat, with Kirstie just 0.1 seconds off her PB. All 4 athletes, as well as Katie Bartlett comfortably made the required erg standard to compete on the water the following day, where all girls had solid rows, with Katie heading the Nottingham contingent.
Back in Nottingham, our development squad were competing at the BUCS indoor erg series. For Annie, Fleur and Grace this was their first 2k indoor competition, with all gaining PBs, and Annie taking a massive 11 seconds off her PB to win silver. Our novices all handled the competition environment well, coming away with a win in the beginner event and some promising performances all round. On Sunday, Grace, Annie and Fleur were back in action, joined by Carly, to race novice singles at the Nottingham Autumn Head. Held in foggy but calm conditions, Annie continued her success, winning the event by over 10 seconds. For all this was a great learning experience. Rosie Taylor and Kellie were also racing over the longer 5450m course in the first division, putting down some good performances.

Last weekend, in some blustery conditions, our intrepid IM1 4x took to the tideway to race the Fours Head of the River. The quad of Kat, Caitlin, Wilks and Kirstie weaved through numerous crews to finish 3rd in their division, and 8th womens crew overall, a great performance, and one to build on leading up to the 8s head in March.

Until next time

This must be one of the busiest weekends for the squad, with our senior athletes off to GB trials and our development squad racing at BUCS indoors and the Nottingham Autumn Head. Caitlin, Wilks, Katie, Kirstie and Kat will all be testing themselves against the rest of the country, including current World Championship medallists at the first assessment for GB rowing team candidates, first with a 2k ergo test, followed by a 5km water trial in singles on the Sunday. Georgina and Laura are both sitting out this weekend whilst they recover from a recent bout of illness.

The development group are racing at BUCS indoors on Saturday. This is a regional competition, with results then collated nationally to decide the top 4 athletes in the country on the rowing machine. Racing is held over 1000m for beginners, and 2000m for the girls who have been rowing for more than a year. For most this is their first taste of rowing competition, and all are looking forward to seeing how they compare to their competition.

We also have 6 athletes competing on Sunday at the local Nottingham Autumn Head, raced over 5450m in the first division, and then the shorter 2000m course for our 4 novice scullers from last year. Fingers crossed the weather behaves for everyone racing on Sunday.

After this weekend, focus will turn to the fours head held in London on 7th November, where we have an elite and an IM1 quad entered.

After a long break we are slowly getting the blog up and running, and what better place to start than the British Rowing Championships held at the National Water Sports Centre in Nottingham. All athletes who wish to represent Great Britain at U23 and senior level in the following season are required to race, resulting in a high standard of competition, with club athletes racing against World Champions. This was the squads first test of speed for the 2015-16 season. Due to some illness we had just 3 crews entered:

Senior 2x: Rosie Wilkins and Kirstie Bartlett
U23 2x: Katie Bartlett and Robyn Armstrong
U23 Lwt 2x: Rosie Taylor and Kathryn Aguilar-Agon

The day started with 1900m time trials, with Kirstie and Rosie progressing to the A/B semi finals after placing 11th, Robyn and Katie moving to the C/D semi finals whilst Kat and Rosie moved to the G/H semi final. After some tights racing in the semi finals, the crews progressed to the B, C and G finals respectively. To make for come close racing throughout the regatta, all doubles race based on their speed in the time trials, regardless of sub category. Overall results were Senior 2x 11th (7th in category), U23 2x 15th (4th in category) and U23 Lwt 2x (8th in category). Grace Clough was also racing in NRC colours in a composite 4- with Thames RC and Leander Club and had a successful day at the lake, coming home 3rd in the B final to place her 9th overall.

The end of Brit Champs marks the start of the head season, and from here the High Performance girls will be looking forward to trials on 31st/1st November, whilst the development squad will be racing at BUCS Indoor Erg Champs on the 31st and the Nottingham Autumn Head on the 1st November

Until then it's back in to the singles and hoping the cold weather stays away for as long as possible!