Following a solid winter and some good training outings in previous weeks Quintin’s H8 (from bow: Huw Jones, Graham Bagnall, Slavo Radosevic, Jonathan Ferris, Fred Jefferies, Andy Tompkins, Geoff Peel, Ian Hyslop, cox Jane Adams) was raring to go on race day. The weather was good, the previous strong winds had mostly faded away and all that was left was to go out and perform on the day. Competing in the combined G/H category meant that a handicap would be applied to the times of the G crews – and we knew it would be tight between us and old rivals Bedford/Star (G).
Stroke man Ian Hyslop set out a straightforward race plan: go off sharply, keep the rating around 33, save some energy for later but leave it all out there by the finish line. Off the start the boat was humming and we soon caught Tevere from Italy, then Marlow. After that was a large gap and we had to briefly stop to ride out big washes from rescue launches – we knew something was up but ploughed on having shipped a quantity of water. The boat still felt good however and with some good steering and great calls from our cox Jane Adams, we caught Reading down the final straight and Walbrook on the line.
The results showed that we were 3rd on raw times in the G/H category, and 2nd to Bedford/Star by 0.53 seconds after application of handicaps. Such is life, onward and upward! GH 8+
