One of our rowers, Chris Morahan, has made a video of the 2012 Men’s 1st 8.

Not only did the Men’s 1st 8 manage to retain their title of Championship 8s, won for the first time only the year before, but the 2nd 8 also managed to push the boundaries of NUBC achievement by winning their category for the first time ever.

Women's Double

The day got off to an inauspicious start with the news that the novice events for the day had been cancelled due to poor weather. This came as a crushing disappointment to the Novice Men, who had been hoping to race their coxed four, news made only worse by the fact that the actual weather was significantly better than had been forecast.

However, the gloom started to lift with a series of strong performances from the Women’s Squad. Although the Intermediate Quad narrowly lost out on a medal, coming 4th by half a length, both the A and B intermediate pairs reached the final, with the A pair finishing in bronze medal position – having been pipped on the line to the silver position by Durham by just 0.1 seconds. The Championship Women’s pair also won bronze, earning the club its first BUCS points of the weekend. An even better performance came from the lightweight women’s double, who managed to trounce the traditional competition of Durham and Reading, and achieved a Silver medal.

Women's intermediate pairs

But the true stars of the show on Saturday were the Men’s 8s, who put months of training to the test and came up strong. Both the 1st and 2nd 8 won their heats with grace and aplomb, proceeding directly to their final. While it may have looked a perilous situation at the 1K mark for the 2nd 8, sitting 1 second down on Oxford Brookes, their class and finesse shined through, letting them walk away from their rivals to cross the line a relaxed 4 seconds ahead. The 1st 8 decided that it had no time for such frippery and set the agenda by being a cool 2 seconds ahead of their opposition after only 500 metres, and up by over 10 seconds at the finish line.

After these impressive outings, both eights retired to the comfort of their hotels to wait out the next 5 hours, feasting on a diet of caffeine gel, protein shakes and optimistic pep-talks. Clearly, this paid dividend as what followed will surely be talked about at great length and retold endlessly in alumni dinners and parents’ evenings.

The 2nd 8 wonder if there is anyone else

With the hopes of an expectant club behind them, the 2nd 8 boated first and headed to the start. This journey up was not without incident however, as rivals from Durham University had somehow got it into their heads that by saying their club name at every waking moment and imitating the crowing of chickens their boat would somehow gain extra speed. This philosophy was not to the approval of the race umpires, who took such a dim view of Durham’s rumbustious behaviour that they ordered a restart of the race roll call.

When the race eventually started, it became apparent that Durham’s tactics had paid off – just not for them. The 2nd 8 were half a length up on them by the 500m mark, and although Oxford Brookes were ahead at this point, the pain of having to race four times in one day came back to haunt Brookes – who swiftly burnt out and fell by the wayside.

The 1st 8 leave the water victorious

Both Newcastle and Durham sped past Brookes, and with 500m to go the 2nd 8 sat 4 seconds up on Durham in 2nd place.

So confident of success were the 2nd 8 that they decided to ease off and save themselves for the victory celebrations – allowing Durham to close a second by the finish line. But this was proved an entirely academic consideration, as the 2nd 8 crossed the line as winners for the first time in the club’s history. The excitement of the moment swept up all the crew, and so overwhelmed Will Sadler (in the 6 seat) that he caught a crab and was knocked off his feet.

Yet this proved a fleeting incident, for as the 2nd 8 spun on to the medals stage, a happy sight confronted them – Newcastle’s 1st 8 was also striding to victory. Having led from the start, and a cool 4.5 seconds up on their next opposition after 1500m, the 1st 8 shifted down a gear into exhibition mode and rowed across the line as champions for an unprecedented second year in a row. The celebrations were just as intense, with strokeman George Rossiter leaping to his feet (his blade soaring wildly into the air) to the cheers of the 2nd 8 from across the lake.

Having received their medals, both crews turned to head back to the hotel, tired but very happy – but not before both coxes had been flung in the lake.

Coxes fly into the lake

The 1st and 2nd 8s with their medals

The 1st VIII fly under Hammersmith

The head season finished in style, haircuts aside, with a boat-club record breaking top ten finish at the Men’s Head of the River for Newcastle’s First Eight. After gaining such a decisive win over the competition at BUCS fours and eights head, the first eight was looking to be the strongest Newcastle have had for some time. As such, expectations and excitement were high with the prospect of the clubs best ever performance.

As the crews started to boat, the rain began to pour. Luckily this was not to be prophetic of their performance as a first eight coxed by Ruaridh Macphee, of George Rossiter, Tim Clarke, Ed Ford, Sam Arnot, Alex Leigh, Tom Ford, Chris Morahan and James Reeder set off 45^th. Overtaking as they made their way up the course the eight looked strong heading under Hammersmith Bridge. Their final result did not disappoint. Moving up an incredible 38 places from last year, they finished in an impressive seventh place, the best the boat club has ever placed, improving on our previous record by ten places.

The Second Eight, coxed by Charles Barry and stroked as smoothly as he treats the ladies by Nick Buckle, followed by Jasper Holst, Will Sadler, Sam Wilson, Andrew Ronaldson, Liam Rose, Freddie Stuart, and bringing up the rear Matt Smith, also proved their mettle. They improved by seven places on last year’s already impressive result. A third eight had a wonderful outing and managed to reach the finish line. Finally the Novice Men’s Eight dealt with the conditions very well considering it was their first race on the Tideway, finishing in a similar place to last year.

This leaves Newcastle with arguably the strongest Men’s squad in the country at present and with BUCS regatta just around the corner there looks set to be an NUBC domination of the medal podium.

An Intermediate eight of Portia Wing, Nicole Lamb, Georgia Parry, Franziska Horbach, Gemma Hall, Philippa Neill, Harriet Broad, Izzy Vyvyan and Flic Warner made the trip down to London to lay down the gauntlet for Durham after a close result at BUCS.  From training on the maelstrom the Tyne often is, the tideway conditions were more than manageable with flat water and a light headwind up to Hammersmith.

Setting off 21^st, with Durham and Reading setting off 13^th and 1^st respectively, Newcastle had some chasing to do. They went through Hammersmith Bridge in tenth place, two places ahead of Durham. However a strong increase in the strength of the headwind coming through Hammersmith allowed Durham to pull back Newcastle’s three-second lead to finish just ahead of them in a time of 20:45.11 to our 20:45.38. We finished third in our category with Reading winning the event fifteen seconds ahead of Durham in second place and Newcastle swiftly following. Overall Newcastle’s first eight was placed twelfth overall, moving up 13 places from last year, and beating the previous best by 9 places.

A Novice eight also competed at the head in the Novice Academic Eights event. They too went through Hammersmith in a strong position, 112, eight seconds behind the winners St Catherine’s College Cambridge. However they too fell foul of the headwind and finally finished sixth in their event, nineteen seconds behind first place. For an inexperienced novice crew on the tideway, this result is respectable and should galvanise the novice squad into action for the summer’s racing.

Alas this was not to be as despite their typical Poly tactics, such as delaying their arrival, swapping their crews over and doing their best to prevent laughter from the Boat Club steps at their “poogpr rowing tekkers”, their efforts were in vain against the strength and depth of Team Newcastle.

The four races that followed were done in coxless quads- boats with four rowers who row with two oars (sculling). The Women’s Intermediate Quads paddled to the start line at the top of the Newburn straight, with Flic Warner, Georgia Parry, Charlotte Irving and Sally Hickey representing Newcase.

In the first 100m it seemed that Northumbria were actually holding their own (much to their handful of supporters’ amazement) however, this was not to last and their hopes of a shock win were quickly dashed.

The NUBC girls put the power on and surged home to beat their rivals by a clear three boat lengths. The result was particularly disheartening for the Poly as they fielded their four strongest girls in their intermediate quad, clearly with the hope of snatching some cheeky points from the day.

The girl’s win was followed by a similarly commanding performance by the Intermediate Men, comprising of Alex Leigh, Nicholas Buckle, Matt Smith and Sam Wilson. They won comfortably by five boat lengths over the tiring Northumbria crew, who appeared to just be “chopping around” in the water.

The Senior Quads then took to the water fresh after winning silver in the Women’s Championship Quad at BUCS Head and dominating on their way to Gold in the Men’s Championship Quad.

Both crews (Women Quad: Gemma Hall, Nicole Lamb, Franziska Christiane and Phillipa Neil; Mens Quad: Ed Ford, Tom Ford, Sam Arnot, James Reeder) began their races with full intent, drive and power but soon found themselves lowering their rates from a ‘racing 35 strokes per minute’ to a mere training paddle as they saw the Poly fall by the wayside once again.

Both crews finished over 200m in front of their opponents, crossing the finishing line without a bead of sweat on any of their brows. Needless to say the race was unforgiving for Northumbria who crossed the line having once again been thrashed by NUBC at Stan Calvert.

This article was originally featured on the Courier website.

With a strong Novice squad this year, things looked promising for the Saturday beginner events. The first division comprised of the Men’s Beginner eights and the Women’s Coxed Beginner fours. However British weather never can be relied upon, and the crews had to deal with a powerful and gusty headwind that caused the second division of the day to be cancelled. Amongst several capsizings, sinkings and crashes, the Newcastle crews dealt with the conditions admirably, with the novice men’s eight finishing seventeenth out of fifty-three crews. The women’s coxed four showed real mettle and battled through to win a bronze medal, and the first of the weekends BUCS points for NUBC.

By Sunday the wind had calmed considerably and racing went ahead as usual. The first division was dominated by Newcastle, medalling in almost every event entered. Gold was won by the men in the Championship coxed fours, with a crew of Ed Ford, Sam Arnot, Chris Morahan and Tim Clarke and Charles Barry and in the Men’s Intermediate coxed fours with Will Sadler, Andrew Ronaldson, Nick Pilling, Liam Rose and Ruaridh Macphee. George Rossiter, Alex Leigh, Jasper Holst and James Reeder also won silver in the Men’s championship coxless fours.  A Men’s Quad of Nick Buckle, Tom Ford, Sam Wilson and Matt Smith came a respectable fifth amongst tough competition.

With the men setting the standard in the first half of Division one, the women followed suit, finishing third in Championship Eights, close behind Reading and Durham. With crews to chase down, this sets them in good stead for Women’s Head next weekend. The Novice Women were also looking for a chance to score even more BUCS points for NUBC in Intermediate Women’s Eights, however due to a rudder malfunction they were unfortunately prevented from reaching their full potential. In the last event of the division, the Women’s lightweight quads more medals were won for Newcastle, with Lexy Dobson, Sarah Fabes, Izzy Cordes and Rosie Rust getting Bronze.

After a storming first division, Newcastle did not disappoint in the second. The Men’s Championship Eight dominated their event, winning gold over Durham by twelve seconds. With the Head of the River in just under a month, this is an incredibly encouraging result and will hopefully set the standard for the year. The Men’s Intermediate Eight also posted an impressive result, not only winning their event, but also coming fourth overall. Once again this not only shows the strength of the current NUBC senior men’s squad, but the depth and volume of talent, which is greatly promising, not only for this year, but also for the next few.

These results were swiftly followed with equally impressive ones by the strongest women’s squad NUBC has had for a while.  A championship quad of Fanziska Horbach, Nicole Lamb, Gemma Hall and Philippa Neill won silver in their event and a championship coxed four of Izzy Vyvyan, Georgia Parry, Sally Hickey, Harriet Broad and Stevie Potter came fourth in their event against tough competition.

All in all an excellent set of results were clocked up across the weekend by all squads, winning an incredible amount of BUCS points for the University and medals for the club. The performances also cement Newcastle at the forefront of University rowing, proving that we mean business going in to the major headraces of the season. Undoubtedly this is just a taster of NUBC success to come.

In the men’s heavyweight category, Sam Arnot delivered the best score of the day with a powerful 6:00.5, and Newcastle’s men filled plenty of the top slots; the lightweight men filled postions 2-5, whilst in the heavyweight women event Nicole Lamb was the fastest NUBC woman of the day, finishing her 2000m erg in 7:14. In the lightweight women category, Gemma Hall scored a personal best of 7:19.4, which was not only the fastest time of the day in her category but currently ranks her as the fastest BUCS lightweight women in the country.

In the beginner events, the novice women demonstrated good strength-in-depth, whilst the novice men also put in a strong performance. For both novice squads, their first 2k test is always going to be a steep learning experience but it was impressive to see them pushing themselves so hard.

Focus for our GB trialists switches to the 2nd compulsory assessment on Saturday 17 December, held in Boston, Lincs and is a 5000m time trial in singles and pairs. For the rest of the club, training continues as usual until the end of term, before switching to the Christmas training programme.

The meeting began at 17:00, and was well attended by current students and alumni.

The Club Constitution and present banking arrangements were re-ratified.

Edward Ford was elected Chairman, Charles Barry was elected Treasurer and James Faire was elected Secretary.

In addition, the following others were elected to sit on the Club Committee:

• Edward Stephenson
• James Pentlow
• Tom Wright
• David Symes
• Colm Tolan

NUBC sent two boats to compete in the Fuller’s Head of the River Fours this weekend on the Tideway.

Racing just over 4 miles, the Mens Coxed Four (George Rossiter, Sam Arnot, Ed Ford, Tim Clarke, cox Charles Barry) was entered into the Elite Category, where it finished a respectable 75th overall and 9th in their category. The Women’s Quad (Franziska Horbach, Ami Hodges, Nicole Lamb, Phillipa O’Neill) competed in the Intermediate 1 category, and finished an impressive 4th in their category, 203rd overall.

Newcastle Alumni were out in force during the race, racking up some wins and fast results. Fred Gill (2008) and Henry Pelly (2007) racing as Molesey gave the winning Leander boat (packed with the GB Olympic squad) a run for its money in the Elite Coxed Four event, finishing a mere 10 seconds behind Olympic Champion Pete Reed. Nathan O’Reilly (2008) and Murray Wilkojc (2011) won the Senior Coxless Four event as Tideway Scullers, fending off stiff competition from Leander, which featured Sean Dixon (2011).

On Sunday, NUBC took to the water for the combined BUCS/GB 5km time trial in singles followed by two divisions of small boat racing. NUBC dominated the pairs events, winning gold and silver in the men’s event, and winning silver and bronze in the women’s event. In the men’s double event, Tom Ford and James Reeder came fifth in a very strong field. Gemma Hall won silver in the lightweight women’s single category before teaming up with Ami Hodges to win silver in the lightweight women’s double, ahead of NUBC alumnus Lucy Glendinning, who won bronze for Durham University.

Newcastle beat close rivals and neighbours, Durham University in all the crew events except for the men’s double, which is a strong statement of intent for the upcoming season and hopefully our performance won’t scare Durham from racing us at the Boat Race this year.

Focus now switches towards preparations for the Fours Head of the River on 5 November, where the club has entered a men’s coxed four and women’s quad. After that, NUBC will be racing at Rutherford Head of the River on 3 December before entering the North East Indoor Rowing Championships on 7 December.

Results and crews:

BUCS Small Boats Head

M2-

Sam Arnott/George Rossiter – Gold

Ed Ford/Tim Clarke – Silver

W2-

Nicole Lamb/Georgia Parry – Silver
Charlotte Irving/Franziska Horbach – Bronze

WLw2x

Gemma Hall/Ami Hodges – Silver

WLw1x

Gemma Hall – Silver

For full results, visit the BUCS website here.