The Club’s WJ15 and 14 squads rounded off the season with racing at Staines Regatta. The 500m sprint regatta is organised in waves throughout the day so competitors can race in more than one event. Some of the girls coming away with three trophies after the club picked up wins in both WJ15 and WJ14 Quads, in three double sculls events WJ16, WJ15 and WJ14, and a win in WJ15 single sculls.
In the first wave of the day, Henley had three WJ15 2x, Florence Lenthall and Freya Weiser, twins Sophie and Emma Eltze and Allysha Stokes and Ruby Roger. In their first round, Florence and Freya had a comfortable 5L victory over Guildford RC, Sophie and Emma lost narrowly by 3ft to City of Bristol with some unfortunate steering not helping. Ruby and Allysha had a bye to the semi final which saw them up against Florence and Freya, who won this round to face City of Bristol in the final. Florence and Freya going on to win the final by 3 lengths.
In the second wave of racing, Freya teamed up with Matilda Macartney to compete in the older WJ16 2x. A bye to the semi saw them racing Hereford RC which they won by 3 lengths and then went on to win the final by a similar margin against Weybridge RC.
Also racing in this wave was Gwennie Hunter and Anna Merritt in WJ15 1x. Gwennie beat City of Bristol in the first round which then saw her face Anna in the semi. A tight race which saw Gwennie come out the winner to then face Bentley of Guildford RC in the final and winning by 4 lengths.
In the second wave as well, the WJ14 4x+ of Florence Short, Lilya Wild, Josie Savin, Kaia Marston and cox Eleanor Quinn got through their first race against Surbiton High School with just under a 2 length victory. They then met the other Henley boat of Holly Fuller, Nicolette Pagdin, Annie Hunt, Honor Kennedy and cox Alysha Stokes, in the semi final who they beat by 1 length. In the final, they met another Surbiton HS crew and were victorious, winning again by 1 length
Third wave of the day saw three Henley WJ15 4x+ racing. A first round race against Barn Elms was very close for the Gwennie Hunter, Sophia Jobbins, Matilda Macartney, Florence Lenthallm, cox Freya Weiser quad who won by just ¾ of a length in one of the fastest times of the day. This set them up for a semi final race against club mates Anna Merrit, Evie Bell, Daisy Janes, Ruby Roger cox Kaia Marston, which the Gwennie crew won. In the other semi final race the quad of Allysha Stokes, Emily Simmonds, Sophia Spanswick, Emma Eltze cox Sophie Eltze beat Staines Boat Club by 2.5 Lengths to make it an all Henley final. In a relatively tight race the Gwennie Hunter boat came away with the one length victory.
The WJ14s had three 2x racing in this division. After getting through the quarter final, by beating a Surbiton HS crew the double of Nicolette Pagdin and Lilya Wild, came up against their Henley team mates of Honor Kennedy and Josie Savin. In a very close race, the Pagdin/Wild double kept their cool to win by 1/2 a length. In the final, they beat yet another Surbiton High School crew to win their last race of the season by 2 lengths.
