Saturday saw Henley Rowing Club Juniors compete at their first regatta (side by side race) of the season, making a welcome change from the long distance head races that they had been competing in to date. The event was the British Rowing Junior Inter Regional regatta contested between 13 Teams, based on the British Rowing Regions, with the Thames Region split into its three sub-regions Henley being part of Thames Upriver. The format was the now customary time trial raced over 1000 metres then finals over 1500 metres with the fastest 6 from time trial to the A final and the rest to B and C finals and all crews being awarded points based on their finish position for an overall team prize a boys team and a girls team prizes.
Henley had five crews representing the region which had been selected from either trials or for the 8s the fastest regional crew from Schools Head.
The J14 boys' quad scull of Miles Vann, Flynn Burrow, James Weeks, Franco Bigmore-Wallace, and Theo Berry as cox started well with a win in the Time Trial in the morning and lined up for their first six-lane race in the afternoon. However, after a good start they found themselves trailing by a quarter length and had to press their opponents hard. They gradually made the ground back but only showed ahead with 250m to go and after an exciting tussle eventually took gold by less than a second.
The J14 girls’ quad Emily Robinson, Juliet Len, Camilla Barlow, Isabella Hughes and cox Amy Scott raced well in the time trial to finish fourth, 10 secs behind the fastest boat from Scotland. The final was a close race with four boats contesting the top position whilst the Henley girls closed the gap on the Scottish crew they couldn’t quite get passed them and took a very creditable second place for Silver.
At the J15 age group Henley represented the region in the girls single sculls and girls coxed four. Ella Butler in her single finished in 13th in the time trial and was placed in the B final which she led at the start but going into the final 500 metres was one of three boats fighting for first place which Ella took by half a length getting the maximum points available from that race.The coxed four Agnes Chapman, Emma Flloyd, Scarlett Hyde, Daisy Millard and cox Emily Schutz finished third in the time trial with just 3 secs separating the top four boats. In the final the girls got off to a good start but going into the last 500 all six crews were overlapping and in the scramble the girls lost rhythm and slipped back to sixth place
At J16 the oldest age group at the event Henley had the girls eight Evelyn Meeks, Lucy Green, Martha Dickson, Lilian Graham, Charlotte Tong, Molly Hall, Jemima Butterworth, Jemima Painter, cox Elise Pindoria representing the region. In the time Trial the girls finished half a second behind Surbiton representing the Thames London Region. In the final there was no doubt who was going to win, from the off the Henley girls took the lead and continued to build on it to finish two lengths ahead of Thames London.
The Henley results contributed to Thames Upriver winning the overall match and the boys but finishing second in the girls a point behind East Midlands.