Women's 2nd Division University Fours - WIN!!
Just a few lines to congratulate Flo’s Four on their win this afternoon at Uni IVs. Obviously we’re proud of all our crews, but I wanted to mention this race in particular because it was such a good example of how not to panic! Great for everyone to witness but should be particularly inspiring for all our novices.
At the start, Emmanuel (our opposition) were quite a few pips higher than us on the rating (taking more strokes per minute), and were in the lead albeit only by a couple of seats. However Emmanuel were rather short in the water and at perhaps an ambitious rating; they are aggressive and highly competitive but needed to channel it better... Our lower rating but longer strokes served us well and being equally well motivated we had, by the railway bridge, pulled back to nearly half a length up. It takes confidence to race in a way that seems ‘slower’ – but by taking the time to get connected we were at a much more sensible rating and the girls did right to trust that this would allow them to pull through. And I can’t miss the chance for banter by pointing out that by continuing to race away (as opposed to winding down and being complacent once a good margin was established) the crew were able to cope when Lucy B caught a crab and lost her oar. She did incredibly well to recover it (twice!) and was admired by the Emmanuel coaches for her determination in having done so, and the whole crew kept calm and re-started, staying just ahead and eventually re-establishing their margin.
So well done Lucy B, well done Flo for a great line and impressive composure, and very well done to the whole crew. Thanks to our huge bank party as ever, and a final well done to all the crews who raced this week. I thought of all the entrants we appeared to have a particularly high across-the-board standard; most colleges fielded at best 1 decent Four and some other not-so-good Fours. All of ours can be proud of the quality of their technique and of their efforts - the Men's Four and 3rd Women's Four in particular have made quite astonishing improvements in their technique this term, and we also saw our Captain Fran's Four race their hearts out too with good form.
