Boat club sends record crews to World Masters
LOUGHBOROUGH Boat Club is aiming to make a splash this week with a record number of crews taking part in the World Rowing Masters Regatta.
The regatta on Lake Velence in Hungary gets underway today (September 11) and finishes on Sunday (September 15).
Crews from all round the world are drawn in similar age and boat categories, and race eight-abreast over a 1,000 metre course.
Races start every three minutes over the five
days, as 5,033 crews from 740 rowing clubs represent 52 countries take part.
The Masters Regatta is held in a different country each year, and was in Florida in 2018. This year, with the venue easier to reach, the club has made a big effort to enter as many crews as possible, with 12 Men, eight Ladies, and one specialist Coxswain taking part in a wide variety of different boat and age categories.
Sixteen of the club’s boats will be towed across Europe on a trailer, driven by four of the rowers, whilst the remaining members will make their way by air - with a number travelling out the weekend ahead in order to sample the tourist attractions of Budapest!
The regatta is open for entry by any Masters rower over the age of 27 without qualification, so races can span a wide range of abilities from initial club level to ex-international oarsmen and women. Races are arranged between boats that have a similar average age of the crew.
Loughborough’s rowers range from their Captain, Tim Ives, who is 28, to the club’s senior oarsman Nick Maker who clocks in at 69 but who will still be far younger than many other competitors at the event! Regardless of age, it is skill, physical fitness, crew cooperation and desire to win that will decide the medals on the day.
Loughborough Ladies have trained hard together over the last year so as to enter an Eight, steered by former Welsh international cox and Nottingham
Vet School graduate Rachel Harris, and the ladies
also have medal hopes in the Coxless Four which
will be crewed by Vicky Haines, Emily Quinton,
Nadine Storey and Michelle Mills.
Vicky and Emily extend the crew permutations
by also having entered as a Coxless Pair. To ensure that all Loughborough rowers look their best, team member Di Hope-Cokayne has designed and produced a unique Loughborough Boat Club logo for the regatta that will be worn on the crew’s t-shirts.
For the men, the club’s Eight will race in three different age groups, with the crews again separating down into coxed and coxless fours, and with Jerry Heygate and Tom Haines representing the club in the coxless pair.
Meanwhile, there is an experienced team consisting of Mike Targett, Nick Maker, Tim Ives, and
Scott Ferris in the popular Quadruple scull category, whilst the club’s newest members, Jonathan Cox and Laurence Burke, also race in a number of
crews. Veteran sculler Neil Martin has rowed with and coached many of the club’s newer scullers and will hopefully show them how it is done on the day.
The final day of the regatta sees competition between mixed crews, which must comprise an equal split of male and female rowers. Newlyweds Mike and Jen Targett have their eye on a medal in their Double Scull and the Club’s mixed Eight will also compete.
The club’s single scull entry will be raced by captain Tim Ives who said: “Training for all the Loughborough crews has been difficult this year, with a shortage of race experience caused by the cancellation of many UK regattas this summer due to adverse weather.
“However, I am proud that we are fielding such a large turnout of oarsmen and oarswomen, including almost every single one of the club’s Masters, who have planned time off work and paid for their own flights and accommodation in order to attend this prestigious World event - a fantastic effort.
“This inclusivity and team spirit will undoubtedly be noted by other clubs at the Regatta, where Loughborough will demonstrate the club’s motto, which is: ‘The Spirit of Rowing’. ”