Stratford upon Avon Boat Club round-up
Stratford upon Avon Boat Club Masters’ quad of Ellie Davies (stroke), Gina Fusco, Christine Goodwin and Ruth Poulten (bow) secured second spot at the British Rowing Masters Championship on Sunday.
There were six crews in a straight final for the W50+ quads.
The crew faced some tricky conditions at the start but settled into a strong rhythm at a rate of 32 strokes per minute and found themselves in second position chasing the leader, a strong Putney Crew.
The Stratford quad pushed hard and, while they reduced the distance to the leaders, they were beaten by a mere three seconds.
Poulten said: "We executed our race plan and, while we didn’t win, we are delighted with a second place and with our performance."
On the previous day, Saturday, the conditions were very challenging with high waves and gusting head winds.
The race times were considerably slower than previous years.
The MxD4x of Suzie Radley, Dan Simkins, Patrick Taylor and Amanda Bowden went through the heat and achieved fourth place in the final just missing out on the medals.
Suzie Radley and Amanda Bowden then went on to race in the WD2x, coming third in the heat and were delighted to finish the course in the atrocious water.
The conditions had improved by the time of the final and the double rowed well, coming fifth.
Bowden, Stratford's Masters’ vice-captain, said: "All three crews have made progress on this time last year and are enjoying their training and racing."
Meanwhile, for the second year in a row, Stratford dominated the adaptive racing at Marlow Town Regatta and Festival.
They matched last year's performance and only lost one such race all day and that was a close one.
The morning had four Stratford doubles racing.
The finals featured Edward Owen-Smith, a 13-year-old neurodiverse boy, who rowed with one of his teachers, Aron Altman.
Edward was competing for the first time ever and Aron was making his debut for Stratford upon Boat Club.
They crushed the local Marlow opposition by around six lengths.
Jordan Clark competed with a lady rower from Marlow against a strong Oxford crew.
Jordan, another debutant, rowed very well but the more experienced crew just got the better of the contest in the last 100 metres.
The mother and son combination of Ian and Paola Ward competed in the fastest adaptive final of the day against another local Marlow crew.
The Wards consistently pulled away and took the honours by about four lengths.
They will be off to Spain shortly to compete in a Mixed Ability event near Pamplona.
Ricky Clutterbuck and Jake Blatcher confirmed the dominance of Stratford over Marlow crews with a very clear victory in their final.
This was Ricky's second regatta in the United Kingdom and his first success.
The afternoon saw very good adaptive rowers Hattie Throssell and Gillian Middleton competing in two further finals.
In each case comfortable wins were achieved against less accomplished and experienced crews.
The Stratford day ended with adaptive support rower, Jake Blatcher, competing in mainstream singles.
He was knocked out in the semi-final but confirmed his recent technical progress.
At the Rowing World Cup, Stratford Boat Club member Curtis Dickens had a mixed bag of a debut when competing for the GB Pararowing squad for the first time.
In the Friday heat at Varese in Italy, he overdid the effort in the first half of the 2000m course, fading towards the end.
This led to a somewhat different approach in the Saturday final where he eventually came fifth which was a decent result for someone who hadn't rowed two years ago.
Curtis is working hard and is making steady progress towards medaling in 2026 Los Angeles Olympics
Stratford's head adaptive coach Mark Dewdney said: "A Stratford developed pararower finishing fifth in a World Cup event; five wins out of six adaptive events at Marlow which is one of the largest such events on the calendar, I think that qualifies as a good weekend for Stratford's adaptive squad.”
Back at home on the Avon, Stratford upon Avon Boat Club is putting the final touches to their own Junior Sprint Regatta this Saturday.
Racing will be from 8.30am through until 5.30pm.
Dawson Curnock, club chairman and regatta secretary, said: "It’s going to be a very busy day packed full of action on the river.
"Everyone is very welcome into our grounds to watch the racing and visit our tea tent, bar and catering wagon."
