Cygnet Weekly News

Main event of the weekend was Hammersmith Head with our novice crew getting more battle hardened and used to marshalling for an hour is heavy rain and strong winds. They put in a solid performance and tidy rowing to keep Marj happy coming 94 out of 147 overall and 13th out of 17th in category. The crews were tightly bunched and a 14 second improvement would have gained 5 places in the category.

As well as the race we had 4-, 2- and 2x out in windy conditions on Saturday and 4-, 2x and 1x on Sunday morning and we can vouch for how much effort it takes to get to the Pink House against wind and tide at the moment. The 8+ can vouch for how rough it was on the flood tide with wind against tide. And it was good to welcome Tom McCauley to the 4- crews and I hope your hand recover soon.

So we are now 4 weeks away from Head of the River weekend. We have all of 3 weekends to get out on the water. 2 crew have been entered at IM3, we need to see two crews on the water in training. It's asking a lot just to turn up on the day and expect a good result. So please please please make every effort to make the outings for the next 3 weeks. Get your availability up to date on the spreadsheet. Time together as a crew improves performance, cuts your time and gets a better finish position. We will publish the provisional crews shortly, but they are not set in stone (we had to get the crews entered by last Friday's deadline). I we can get two eights out we can do race pieces side by side or chasing each other. It gets us fitter and race ready. Make it happen!!!

So...

This week,

Tuesday 7:15

Circuits with Maxi at Cavendish School. I hear guys on squad erg night complaining how much it hurts SO IT MUST BE WORKING. Only 4 more sessions to go before HoRR so make them count!.

Thursday 7pm

Squad Erg

Sorry guys it's time to put in the miles. So its 50 mins made up of 10 mins repeats of 4 mins r20, 3 mins r 22, 2 mins r 24, 1 min r26.

Weekend outings at 8am Saturday and Sunday

Please make every effort to get on the water and get two crews out. Sue is available to coach on Sunday and will put you through your paces, Alan with coach on Saturday. As per the squad erg it will be about the hard miles and hard pieces on the river

Further Ahead

Sculling Camp is coming up on the 15-17th April. This is a unique opportunity to get in a single scull on a quiet and calm stretch of the river at our lovely bungalow at Hamhaugh Island. For our new novices you can get the basics of sculling in the Weybridge play pen then develop them back at base over the summer. Sculling is fab fun, singles are scary and exhilarating and a great thing to master, great satisfaction as your skills improve and you gain control of the boats and freedom of the Tideway.

It has also been suggested that for more experienced rowers we make it more of a training camp ie more work less beer, or no beers before 6pm. If there is the interest we could get the boats to the bungalow early and take the Thursday and Friday as additional training camp days. I think it's a great idea. Let me know if you are interested.

That's all from me, have a great week, see you for the erg on Thursday

Jez