On Saturday 14th November at the Inverness Fours Head on the Caledonian Canal, ASRA crews notched up four category wins:
Division 1
On Saturday 31st October at the Aberdeen Fours Head, crews from the Association won 6 category titles. In a record entry for the event welcome opposition at junior level came in the form of a large squad from George Heriot's School of Edinburgh.
Division 1
On Sunday 1st November at the Aberdeen Small Boats Head, ASRA crews took 9 category titles with considerable style despite the persistent torrential rain.
Division 1
On Saturday 24th October, at the Tees Long Distance Sculling Head and the Tees Small Boats Head, athletes from ASRA won a record 7 category titles over the two 5k races against first class Northern English opposition.
Long Distance Head
Small Boats Head
Highly unfortunate to lose out on further medals were Iona Riley in Women's J18 Sculls by a second to hosts Tees Rowing Club and Elliot Bruce, Atholl Wallace, Robert Hamlet & Lewis McCue in Men's Junior 18 Coxless Fours by two seconds to Talkin Tarn.
At the Home Countries International Regatta in Nottingham on the 25th of July, 11 ASRA athletes were capped for Scotland, the majority for the first time.
Our boys Junior Coxless Four - Ollie Hamlet, Gary Wilson, Daniel McSherry & Atholl Wallace - predictably found their event tough going but put in a creditable performance in difficult conditions at this very high level.
Similarly our J16 girls - Rachael Hadjitofi & Holly Reid - who rowed stern pair in the scratch Women's Junior Eight - are young enough to do another two HIRs, and will have gained enormously from the experience of rowing at this level.
Our J17 girls - Rosie Morton, Catriona Bain, Iona Riley & Jamie Steel - had rowed their coxless four to gold in Cardiff last year and were expected to medal again this year. Their performance in the 4- was in fact well below par and they were beaten in this race into third position by both the English and the Irish. Their 4+ performance was however much better and in any other year might have been good enough to take gold. As at Nat. Champs., they remained comfortably ahead of their English rivals from Stratford, but they were no match for the brilliant Irish foursome who incredibly sprinted the 2k course at ratings which never fell below 37 strokes per minute.
Overall our athletes showed signs of overtraining and general fatigue and in hindsight perhaps we should have brought them home for a rest before taking them up to the next level. Next year the HIR comes to Strathclyde Park and we will have run out of excuses!
At the National Rowing Championships of Great Britain held in Nottingham from the 17th - 19th July, 7 of the 8 ASRA crews entered reached the finals of their various events.
On Saturday 20th June girls from ASRA took part for the first time ever in the Women's Henley Regatta and 21 crews from England, Scotland, Wales, Canada and the USA lined up to compete for the the Groton Challenge Cup. Our girls - fresh from their victories in coxed and coxless fours at the Scottish Championships - rowed comfortably enough through the time trials stage, despite a blustery head wind, to qualify for the competition proper, unofficially in 8th equal position out of 21. Too comfortably as it turned out, since they ended up in the bottom half of the draw where it was their misfortune to be pitched against top seeds and fastest qualifiers, the American girls from Peddie School, New Jersey, in the first knock-out round of the competition.
The self-styled Falcons had in fact been crowned North American Champions in Coxed Fours the previous week at the US Rowing Youth National Championships on Harsha Lake in Batavia, Ohio and now demonstrated in no mean fashion that their emphatic victory stateside by a full 10 seconds over the runners-up from Mercer Junior Rowing Club had been no accident.
Our girls put up their usual blistering start - 47 strokes a minute - and by the end of Temple Island were still showing a slight lead over the American girls. From then on however the the Falcons put on a show of incredible power and disciplined rowing that left us floundering in their wake. Our girls did not give up easily and lifted the rating again and again to try to claw back some of the increasing lead being established by the Americans. By the last five hundred however it was clear that for the now perfect windless rowing conditions on the course we were chronically undergeared and that increased rating alone was not going to make up for our lack of leverage.
A great deal was learned however and the girls and accompanying coaches felt the experience to be extremely worthwhile. We now know the course and the challenges involved in competition on the Henley course and on a future occasion, amongst other things, would insist on hotel accommodation for our athletes and allow ourselves at least 2 days acclimatisation and fine tuning on the course prior to the regatta. One half hour outing the evening before was plainly not enough!
At the Scottish Rowing Championships at Strathclyde Park on 13th and 14th June, ASRA crews won gold in a total of 18 events over the two days of the regatta. The results are quoted in the order in which the events were won.
Saturday
Sunday
On Saturday 6th June under the auspices of the Aberdeen Schools Rowing Association the first ever Aberdeen Inter-Schools Regatta took place on the Dee. Representatives from six participating schools - Albyn School, Bankhead Academy, Cults Academy, Harlaw Academy, Hazlehead Academy and Kincorth Academy - took part in the 39 knock-out races for the Aberdeen Inter-Schools Cup. Outright winners in the end were the boys from Cults Academy - Callum Taylor, George Colleron, George Turner and Tom Cook, coxed by Tom Reevel of AUBC.
At the Castle Semple Regatta, Lochwinnoch, on Saturday 30th May, crews from the Aberdeen Schools Rowing Association, with two girls from the Inverness Rowing Club, won the inaugural Inter Regional Championship of Scotland for Team North. The most outstanding contribution to the team total was made by the ASRA Junior Under 15 boys qaud - Nic Riddoch, Lewis McCue, Robert Hamlet & Blair Sorbie coxed by Niall Ford.
In the open events ASRA crews racked up a total of 7 wins.
At the prestigious National Schools' Regatta, Nottingham, held from 22nd - 24th May at the English National Watersports Centre in Nottingham, all five Aberdeen Schools' Rowing Association crews successfully passed from the time trials into the semi-finals of their events. The Boys' Junior 14 Quad, Junior 15 Doubles and the Junior 16 Coxed Fours failed to progress at that stage, but the Girls' Junior 16 and Junior 18 Coxed fours both won their semi-finals in style to move on to their respective finals. The Girls' Junior 16 quartet - Christie Duff, Morven Shaw, Rachael Hadjitofi & Holly Reid coxed by Emily Geddes - after a horrendous start in their final, clawed their way back into contention and were unlucky to cross the line in fourth position in the wake of the St. George's College crew they had already beaten in the semi-final. Pride of place has to go again however to our 2008 Home Countries Champions- Rosie Morton, Iona Riley, Catriona Bain & Jamie Steel coxed by Lily Taylor - who had to interrupt their Highers' preparations to make this trip at all. After a dream start where they took a length off the English Inter-Regional champions from Stratford-on-Avon, the ASRA girls dominated the 2K race until the last 10 metres where (à la Katherine Grainger) they succumbed to a tremendous push from the English girls to lose in a photo-finish by a heart-breaking 0.25 seconds. Silver this time around, but they will lock horns with the Stratford quartet again at Women's Henley in June (if they can raise a suitable sponsor!) and in any case at the National Championships of Great Britain in Nottingham in July.
At the North East Regatta on the 9th & 10th May there were a record number of entrants from a whole range of Scottish clubs including George Heriot's and George Watson's. 107 races were held over the 700 metre course from Polmuir to the Aberdeen Boat Club Boathouse. Races involved 145 different crews ranging in size from single sculling boats to coxed Eights and competitors' ages from 13 years to over 65.
The Championship of the Dee trophy is presented to the most successful club over the weekend's racing and ASRA not only won it for the second year in succession but smashed all previous records with an unparalleled score of 264 points by the end of the regatta. The second placed club, Aberdeen Boat Club with 128 points, amassed less than half of ASRA's record-breaking total and Aberdeen University Boat Club came in third place with 78 points.
Full details of the events and crews who performed so well for ASRA are to be found on the Committee of the Dee website.
At the Strathclyde Park Regatta, Motherwell, on the 25th & 26th April, despite blustery cross winds and cold conditions, ASRA crews broke the previous record of 13 Golds set up last year at this by one and this time around the boys were the major contributors to this fantastic medal haul.
At the annual Gent Spring Regatta in Belgium on the 11th & 12th April ASRA won an unprecedented number of medals (2 gold, 3 silver and 2 bronze) in a series of hard fought races against some of the best junior rowers in Belgium, France, Germany and GB.
Our J17 girls - Rosie Morton, Catriona Bain, Iona Riley & Jamie Steel - and our J16 boys - Blair Sorbie (Saturday)/Robert Hamlet (Sunday), Niall Rundle, Daniel McSherry & Atholl Wallace both struck twice to win gold on Saturday and silver on Sunday in their respective coxless fours and, not to be outdone by their older counterparts, our J14 boys' sculling squad were in medal contention every time they put a blade in water.
In J14 single sculls Lewis McCue came an outstanding third out of a field of twenty-four and then partnered by Cameron Gordon again came third out of twenty-four in J14 double sculls. It was in their coxed quadruple scull however that that Lewis and Cameron - joined now by Elliot Bruce and Ying Huang and coxed by Christie Duff - put in their best performance of the weekend to come within a nail-biting 0.04 of a second of winning gold.
Clearly not every rower could come home with a medal but a quick glance through the full list of results on the Gentse Roei-en-Sportvereniging website will reveal just how well many of the other ASRA crews performed over the weekend. Congratulations to all 32 athletes who took part in the Gent camp and regatta and who through their exemplary behaviour on and off the water did their coaches and the club proud.
The COFD website has a comprehensive photographic record here
At the Scottish Schools' Head of the River Race held at Dullatur on the Forth-Clyde Canal on Saturday 21st March, ASRA won a record 5 of the 8 categories on offer and so was awarded for the first time in its history the Peter Grieve Cup for the most successful team at this event.
Winners' pennants went to the following:
The Peter Grieve trophy would not however have gone to Aberdeen but for the sterling efforts of the four other ASRA crews who fought extremely hard to come second and third in their various racing categories.
Congratulations to all who took part on a magnificent team effort.
At the rescheduled Aberdeen Eights and Junior Fours Head of the River on Saturday 14th March, the ASRA Girls' Junior Eight - Morvyn Shaw, Emily Geddes, Holly Reid, Rosie Morton, Rachael Hadjitofi, Catriona Bain, Iona Riley & Jamie Steel coxed by Erin Wyness won Women's R2 Eights in the impressive time of 13 minutes 38 seconds given the strong and gusting headwind and rough water over most of the course. This made them the fastest female Eight in the whole event by almost half a minute over their nearest rivals from Aberdeen University (WR2 and Open) and Aberdeen Boat Club (WR2 and Novice). The fastest Four in the event was the ASRA Boys' Junior 18 quartet of Robert Hamlet, Gary Wilson, Oliver Hamlet & Daniel McSherry coxed by Nic Riddoch who completed the Head in the equally impressive time of 13 minutes 18 seconds.
Congratulations too to our medallists in Men's J14 Quads - Danny McCue, Peter Spanovic, Elliot Bruce & Lewis McCue coxed by Amelia Donavon, in Men's Junior 16 Fours - Nic Riddoch, Christy Masson, Peter Gonella & Lewis McCue coxed by Andrew Honey, and in Women's J14 Quads - Emily Duff, Katy Malone, Amelia Donovan & Erin Wyness coxed by Mathew Snedden.
At the Inverness Eights and Small Boats Head on 21st February, ASRA crews - in the absence of any junior eights entries - had to measure themselves yet again against adult opposition. Our Men's R2 Eight - Nic Riddoch, Christy Masson, Robert Hamlet, Lewis Masson, Jonnay Wright, Niall Rundle, Daniel McSherry & Blair Sorbie coxed by Lily Taylor - acquitted themselves best of all to come a highly creditable fifth overall in the Head and second in the R2 category to a powerful eight from Dundee University, while our scratch Men's Novice Eight consisting mainly of "graduates" from last year's Dry Start campaign - Alex Comerford, Chris Milne, Niall Ford, Jon Barbour, Tom Honey, Peter Gonella, Patrick Tawns & Lewis McCue coxed by Erin Wyness - battled through to a deserved third place in their section of the competition.
Meanwhile, down in Boston, Lincolnshire, at the GB Long Distance Trial on the 21st & 22nd February, our HIR "awesome foursome" of Rosie Morton, Iona Riley, Catriona Bain & Jamie Steel had to break up into pairs for this stage of the GB selection process. Rosie & Jamie came home 12th in a field of 19 and were the first Scottish crew home, while Iona & Catriona had to be content with 17th place after a serious collision with the bank in the early stages of the race.
At the Scottish Indoor Rowing Championships held at the Heriott-Watt University, Edinburgh on Sunday 1st February, ASRA racked up a total of 6 gold, 3 silver and 4 bronze medals.
Individual Gold
Team Gold
Individual Silver
Team Silver
Individual Bronze
Over 15 Girls winners
Under 15 Mixed winners