Christ's College

Dear Blades

I am writing to update you on the fantastic progress of Christ's Boat Club during the latter part of Michaelmas term.

We still have four University Triallists performing very well going into the crucial selection stages ahead of the various Boat Races next term. Eddie Surtees and Mary Bjorkegren are doing incredibly well and have a very good chance of making the final cut for the Women's Lightweight squad. Esther Gordon-Smith is still doing well coxing for the Women's squad and will soon find out if she has made the final cut. Liz Box has now made it to become one of the final two coxes for the Men's Lightweight squad and should be in a strong position when it comes to the final selection. I look forward to being able to get together some strong Christ's support for the Henley Boat Races on Sunday 22nd March 2009. For those of you who don't know, the Henley Boat Races take place one week before the University Boat Race and include all the other Cambridge vs Oxford rowing fixtures, the Women's Blue Boat, Women's Reserve Boat (Blondie), Women's Lightweight Boat and Men's Lightweight Boat. There should be a lot of Christ's representation this year, so put 22nd March in your diary and I will send out more details closer to the time, it would be fantastic to see you there!

Since I last e-mailed there have been several exciting races including some very good performances by our novices and of course the culmination of the term, The Fairbairn Cup.

On 15th November, the senior crews took part in the Winter Head. This was sure to be a good first test of our performance in VIIIs after having recently completed University IVs. The Men's boat struggled after only having a few outings in the VIII prior to the race. This led to a disappointing performance, eventually coming 17th out of all the colleges. We only narrowly beat the alumni crew (Crustaceans I), who were a mere 6 seconds behind us after very little training! The Women's boat however performed very well, racing the course twice in two different categories. Their previous training in VIIIs earlier in the term paid off, meaning they won one category and narrowly came 2nd in the other! This was the only test of other colleges form in VIIIs prior to Fairbairn's and it certainly gave the Men's squad a lot to think about.

While the senior crews were getting their heads down and training hard for Fairbairn's, it gave an opportunity for our novices to show their ability on the water in the Clare Novice Regatta. After strong performances in Queen's Ergs both the Men's and Women's novices hoped to perform well and lots of people had commented on their superior technical ability in comparison to other colleges.

We had one of the largest bank-parties of any college, demonstrating the huge support network and good camaraderie that we have within the club and making other college crews jealous!

The novices wouldn't have been unjustified to feel some pressure from the number of people watching, but they didn't disappoint, putting in an amazing series of performances and arguably putting Christ's highest on the list of all the colleges, based on average performance. The 1st Novice Men had a fantastic series of races leading up to the semi-final even knocking out the Clare 1st Novice Men in their own regatta! Sadly they lost out in the semi-final to the eventual winners, a strong Lady Margaret crew. However, they put in a huge performance and certainly deserved a semi-final place. The 1st Novice Women had an extremely strong performance and made it to the final in great style, beating several crews including the Clare 1st Novice Women. Needless to say being responsible for knocking out the top crews of the regatta organisers didn't add to our popularity on the day and the 1st Novice Women were unlucky to lose out in the final by a margin of 1 foot to an Anglia Ruskin University crew! As those on the bank will testify, the margin was really too close to call, and at many other regattas would qualify for a re-row. The fierce row, right to the bitter end, was one of the most exciting races I have seen for a long time and I was bitterly disappointed that the girls weren't rewarded for their immense effort throughout the term.

The 2nd Novice Women also made it to the final with a string of good races; however they narrowly lost out to a Jesus crew despite racing very well. This disappointment only fired them up more to get revenge at Fairbairn's! The 2nd Novice Men made it to the semi-final in good form but again narrowly lost out to the eventual winners. The 3rd Novice Men were unlucky and didn't have the best build up to the regatta, which meant they were knocked out early on in the 3rd round however they very much enjoyed the opportunity to race.

The combined performances of the novice crews gave Christ's a superb average tally. We were the only college to have a crew in the semi-final round of all four competitions and all those crews lost out to the eventual winners in either the semi or the final. The Christ's crews also lost by the narrowest margin of all the winner's competitors, arguably making them the second fastest crews!

This left the Fairbairn Cup as the last race of the term to build up to. All the novice and senior crews had plenty of time to get stuck into the last bit of training and make up those crucial seconds to beat their competitors at Fairbairn's.

The results from Fairbairn's were very pleasing. The 1st Women had the pressure of going off first in the division, following the University crews, but acquitted themselves very well, coming 4th after 3 very strong college crews and only 12 seconds behind the winners, Jesus. This is a fantastic result to follow on from the Women's success last year and is very positive for the year to come.

The 1st Men made huge improvements from the Winter Head, coming in 10th overall and 6th fastest college. Although we were 37 seconds behind the winners (First and Third), we beat all our major opponents for the Lent Bumps and many of our usual rivals, putting us in a fantastic position for the rest of the year. This was the highest result for Christ's M1 since 2005, which was a very successful year, so lets hope we can live up to the expectations!

The novices put in very good performances, with the 1st Novice women matching their senior counterparts by coming 4th in their division. This was a great result, reflecting their huge effort over the term and will hopefully spur many of them to stay on next term. The 1st Novice men were slightly disappointed to come 13th in their division but the opposition was strong and they still had a very good row. Again, this will hopefully mean many of them stay on next term and strengthen the senior squad!

Particular congratulations must go to our 2nd Novice women who won their respective division and came an incredibly impressive 10th overall, beating a large number of 1st crews. This bodes very well for the women's squad again this year and should lead to good success next term. The 2nd and 3rd Novice men came 21st and 33rd respectively but also came 5th and 2nd in their respective divisions, which is a very good result. This means that almost all of the current Christ's crews came in the top 5 of their respective divisions which is a very credible achievement for the club as a whole!

I must also give a special mention to our two alumni crews who took the time to come down and put themselves through the physical torment of the Senior Fairbairn's course for another time! The more "recent" alumni crew rowed as Crustaceans I and came a very credible 24th overall and put several college 1st crews to shame. The more "mature" alumni crew rowed as Crustaceans I and put in a huge effort, beating an X-Press crew and hugely improving their performance from last year. I must pass on my thanks to Tom Swallow and Arthur Darby for the very successful organisation of those crews. It is a huge pleasure for the current club members to watch the various alumni crews race and it is fantastic to be able to chat to the various old members around the boathouse. Please do contact me if you would like to be involved in the club in any capacity as I would be very interested to hear from you.

We look forward to our pre-Lent term training camp at Dorney Rowing Lake in early January. This will hopefully give us a good head-start against the other colleges next term and build on our fantastic success from this term. I will be keeping you updated on our progress and the results from next term and I look forward to seeing some of you soon. The support that we get from our friends and alumni is key to the success of the club. The involvement of alumni by coming back for re-unions, races and dinners is very important and special to current members of the club. If you would like to contact the Women's Captain, Penny Thuesen, you can e-mail her directly on pt303.

All that remains is for me to wish you a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year and hears to hoping that 2009 is a successful year for Christ's Boat Club.

All the best,

Duncan Bull
CCBC Captain of Boats 2008 - 2009