Captain's Log
Latest news, requests, moans and cajoling from the skipper
Captaincy update – August 2025 (from your new captain)
27th August 2025
Hello All,
I hope we are all enjoying an extremely well-earned rest!
As my first email to the wider group, I just wanted to share some initial thoughts and plans for the upcoming months. First of all I would like to thank Dom and the outgoing captaincy for all of the hard work they have put in over the last year, and time spent helping me in the last few weeks – it's been thoroughly appreciated. We are certainly in a great place as a club and I really hope we can build on this and achieve even more success this upcoming year.
On this topic, I would like to congratulate all of the squad that raced at Henley T&V regatta, where there was some very competitive across the board. A particular congratulation to Tom and Dom in the 2- who beat the RAF, and won their category.
Looking forward to the upcoming months, we please look at the following key dates for your diary and sign up on fitclub accordingly. Note, the sooner you're able to sign up we will be able to set up some crews - and as shown across the summer, apparently training together makes you go faster!
- Scullers Head 28th September
- Pairs Head 4th October
- Upper Thames Head 26th October
- Fours Head 15th November
- Vets Fours Head 16th November
- Walton Small Boats Head 6th December
- Plum Puddings 13th December
- Quintin Head 25th January
- Head of the Nene 7th February
- Henley Fours and Eights Head 14th February
- Hammersmith Head 28th February
- Head of the River 28th March
These are head races that we have identified as possible targets to make the Head racing season slightly more exciting, and less "Shed based" - and as some are off Tideway we will have to plan accordingly. Please sign up on FitClub, and we can get planning.On the topic of the shed, training will return a proper from the first week of September. We will move our midweek sessions back into the shed - with weights on Mondays and an "exciting" erg on Wednesday. As long as the weather complies, we will keep our weekend sessions on the water where possible. Its worth mentioning, a key reason why there was success at Cygnet during the regatta season, and one of our best HORR results for years, was due to the hard work put in in the Shed, so i encourage everyone to build on this platform and put in the effort this Autumn and Winter.
Other dates for the diary
- End of season dinner
You should have already signed up for this, where on Fri 29th August will be our end of season dinner to come together as a club and celebrate our success this year. - Scamp 5th - 7th September
Its looking likely, due to sign ups, that we wont go to the Bungalow but instead go for a long row to Richmond and back, please look out for further comms on this. - Learn to Row
LTR is back for 6 weeks, from the 8th of September, where we will need volunteers to help support our new intake of LTR participants - please look out for further comms on this. - Team Ordinary Session
A crew of civil servants rowing the Atlantic, are coming down to our boat house so we can help them with rowing technique/take them for an outing. Please sign up on fitclub to help out. Date: Wednesday 10th September, AM. Please see the link to their website - The Oardinary Crew - Sun 14th September - Cygnet and BBL joint club day
This will involve some mixed races and a BBQ. Further details to follow.
Thank you to anyone who has got this far down the email - I will endeavur to be more succinct going forward.
I hope these restful few weeks has made everyone as excited about the year ahead as I am.
Thanks
JordanCaptain's update, 13th July
15th July 2025
Mea culpa, I haven't done a squad update in a while but as the below shows, it has been a busy summer! 3 months of intensive regatta racing, brilliant training, and the odd social beer(s) means that time has flown.
Regatta summary
I won't go through every regatta in detail, but a big shout-out to everyone who has committed to the squad during the summer season. We have progressed leaps and bounds, building on the engines we built during the winter in the gym to excellent improvement on the water in the summer.
The regatta season started with Hammersmith in late April, where we had a 4+ and a 4x- race very competitively, but ultimately both lost to the eventual winners. It was the first regatta for many, and good dusting off the cobwebs for everyone else. We then had a few race at Chiswick in early May, before a great day's racing at Peterborough later in the month - with the Tom/Dom pair reaching the final in a competitive pairs field, ultimately just being outdone at the last hurdle.June saw us compete at Walton & Weybridge in a 4x-, before a bumper entry at Barnes and Mortlake where again we were within just feet of winning both the 4+ and the 4x-. Annoying but it showed the progress we had made over the summer. A quick lessons-learnt and on we marched to Kingston....
And Kingston saw us get our first win of the season, in a high-calibre coxless four category - with wins against Maidenhead and UCL/Bentham in the final. A particular well done to Benjy, Jordan and Tom for their first win in Cygent lycra!We have one regatta left, Henley Town and Visitors on 2 August. We have a bumper entry across pairs, fours and an eight, and so it represents a great chance to go out with a bang!
S'camp
A key part of the squad's improvement has been a very successful "S'camp" weekend at the bungalow. Particular thanks to Tom and others who led on organising it - a massive success. I love the bungalow - a great chance to just row (oh, and drink the odd beer...) - but particularly this year where it was a lot of people's first time visiting. We are planning our next trip for early September so please do sign up on Fitclub so we can start organising accordingly!
Social
It has also been a great period for squad socials - none better than our weekend celebrating 60 years of the relationship with our German partner club, Benrath. The highlight was the Friday at Henley Royal Regatta - our annual social on steroids! Particular thanks to Neil and all others who organised the event - I think it is fair to say everyone enjoyed it!
OGM
Finally, there is the club OGM on Wednesday 23 July at 8pm after the squad training session. Please do come if you can - we will be taking a vote on buying a new boat (a coxed four) and also be voting in a new captaincy. It has been a pleasure being the Captain of Cygnet for the past 12 months - do let me know if you are interested and want to discuss it in more detail.
Onwards!
Regatta Crews
Hammersmith Regatta
4+ Clara, Jim A, Tom C, Dom M, Jordan H4x- Benjy H, Theo T, Ollie R, Mustafa OChiswick
2x-: Ollie R, Mustafa OPeterborough
2- Dom M, Tom CWalton and Weybridge
4x- Charles J, Peter R, Jordan H, Benjy HBarnes and Mortlake
4+ Clara, Dom M, Tom C, Mickey W, Jordan H4x- Charles J, Ollie R, Peter R, Will P4x- Mustafa O, Octavian P, Alex H, Martin DKingston
4x- Charles J, Ollie R, Peter R, Will P4- Dom M, Tom C, Benjy H, Jordan H (Win)Captain's update, 28th April
28th April 2025
Morning team!
And the summer racing season begins!
It’s been a very good month for us, building on the back of HORR. We’ve followed it up with some very strong 2k tests with PBs for the vast majority of the squad. We’ve established strong racing crews and done our first regatta.
We had two entries into Hammersmith this Saturday. The 4+ of Clara, Jim, Jordan, Dom and Tom C lost to the eventual winners of the event (UCL), and the 4x- of Benjy, Ollie, Theo and Mustafa gave a very respectable performance in the final, losing narrowly to London RC . We will build on this and be back stronger!
Thanks also to everyone who helped at the club day on Saturday. The boathouse and surrounding area are looking much better!
Looking ahead, we have a couple of crews entered into Chiswick regatta this Saturday- good luck! There is then a bit of a gap because a couple of events were cancelled. Please could you all detail your availability on the squad WhatsApp group poll with the regattas you can do so that I can plan crews again in advance.
I’m also really looking forward to s’camp in a few weeks time at the start of June. This is a great weekend and more detail is on Tom’s email or on the website here. The downside is organisation is required so please do help us by signing up asap, and do just ask if you have any questions!
Onwards,
Dom
