For the first time in many years Cambois ARC hosted the Wansbeck Regatta. Whilst most entries were in junior categories, with some vets and novices tagging along, the organisers had offered a huge prize of £750 for a challenge open eights sprint over 500m, second prize £250 - more later. Our current competitive juniors attended again in slightly different configurations from Chester-le-Street, with Rachel joining Mina, Ellie and Laura in the WJ14 4x+ (along with our new cox Lois) and Rosie trying the J13 2x with Emma instead.

Rachel tried the WJ14 1x again. The quad and WJ14 doubles had good races but didn't win. Rosie and Emma 'won' their race but were made to rerow because of a clash and just failed in the second try. Robbie won again in the J141x, with Haakon second; their J14 2x had a good race but lost again in a very competitive race. Colin rowed valiantly in the Masters E/F 1x, but lost to George Doody from Hexham

 

Turning back to the men, as a condition of entering the challenge eights, each crew member had to race in at least one other event and we chose the Elite 4x-. Our first quad turned in to a triple when Si dropped out due to an injury (that was OK in an eight), and they only just lost to a Cambois boat in the first round. The second Tyne quad met the same Cambois crew in the final and were beaten also (by a larger margin).

However ........ in the eights event right at the end of the day (in the sun), our men came in their own. There were only three entries but all strong as it turned out. Each boat raced the other two to see if that produced a winner. Durham School beat a young Cambois crew in a well fought race. Tyne then rowed strongly and beat Durham. Finally Tyne outpaced the Cambois boat, but it was not a walkover by any means. The crew of Alex, Si, Dave, Kevin, Dan, Andy, Tim and Julian with Jen (c) were rightly jubilant, having met their fund raising target for the year in four minutes! They are now considering turning professional.