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News Archive

2005
December 2004
November 2004
October 2004
September 2004
August 2004
July 2004
April 2004
March 2004
February 2004
January 2004
2003
2002

30 November

'Changing places' at top of Universities Winter League: Strathclyde (the 2003/2004 season winners) emerge from the Glasgow Fours Head leading the university winter league. Although Glasgow Uni scored heavily last weekend, Strathclyde have been scoring steadily throughout the three rounds. With one round (Clydesdale) to go, there are a series of close battles at various levels of the table. 15 points separate 1st and 2nd, just 3 points separate 3rd and 4th and an even closer 2 points separate 5th and 6th.

29 November

Glasgow Uni 'top club' at Glasgow Fours Head: excellent day's racing on Saturday. The Glasgow approach of having a fixed point two-thirds of the way to the start, and of turning back all crews who have not passed that point 20 minutes before start time, certainly helps avoid crews freezing at their marshalling positions waiting for a delayed start. Full results for Division 1, Division 2, by Event Category and Club Points

Glasgow Uni took 1st place and Edinburgh Uni 2nd place in both M O4+ and M R1 4+, with Strathclyde Uni taking both M R2 and M Nov 4+ titles. Clydesdale took the W O and W R1 4+ events, Edinburgh Uni the W R2 and Dundee Uni the W Nov event. Clyde won both men's and women's 4x events.

Top junior club was George Watson's College (278.5 points) ahead of George Heriots School (237). Interesting to note that the fastest junior crew over the course were the winners of M J16 4+, a composite from Strathclyde Park and Castle Semple - both clubs better known for their junior sculling crews. The same stroke, Shankland, jumped into the winning SPRC/NARC M J18 4+ crew in the second division. The younger sculling events were dominated by Watson's, with a particularly notable race by their Mixed J13 4x in Division 1, finishing 17= in the division overall - tying for time with the EUBC winners of W R2 4+!

200,000 and counting: as you can see, the SARA web site 'hit counter' (left) passed the 200,000 mark this year at some time over the weekend. This is a crude visible counter, but the much more sophisticated one running in the background shows that there are an average of 421 visitors to the site each day and that, collectively since January (and despite my best efforts to minimise file sizes!), you have downloaded pages/images/docs/PDFs totaling over 20 Gigabytes - a daily average of 61 MB.

Inverness Fours Head results re-visited: following a few corrections for veteran status etc, Inverness RC have now published FINAL results for Division 1 and Division 2 of their Fours Head. Also Ron Wallace has published a library of photos which he is pretty confident includes every crew which raced in Division 1 at Inverness

26 November

Important stuff about Glasgow Fours Head! Detailed instructions to crews are here. There are also a series of other safety related documents on Glasgow RC's Fours Head web site - not ones you would always see published, though they exist in the background for every regatta. I'm drawing attention to them here because Glasgow's decision to publish gives rower,s in general an opportunity to see something of the lengths event organisers are increasingly going to to provide safe racing opportunities.

25 November

Scottish Rowing Coaching Conference: registrations for this conference (the rather 'star-studded' programme of speakers is linked from the box-advert on the right) will close on 1st December, and no late applications will be accepted. The applications form is here.

Scottish Universities Winter League and Half Yearly meeting: points after the Aberdeen and Inverness legs are tabulated (left). University clubs are asked to note that the half yearly general meeting of university clubs will take place in the GUBC boathouse at 3.15 on Saturday 27th November (note from A Easson adds "unless event is cancelled").

Updates: a few recent updates to the site, notably:

• Rules of Racing - updated for changes made at the AGM earlier this month
• Club contacts - some changes to committees
• Sales & Wants - a single scull newly on the market
  

23 November

Over 120 fours and quads entered for Glasgow Fours Head: another wee challenge for the competitors, marshals and umpires - getting the more inexperienced crews marshalled at the start on the Clyde is especially awkward if the stream is running a bit. It takes a LONG TIME for younger and novice crews to paddle up from the boathouses by the weir in particular, so do give yourselves plenty of time. Provisional start orders are now up for Division 1 and Division 2. I've been told to expect safety and marshalling instructions separately and will publish them/links to them as soon as I hear.

Hanna pulls a pot at BIRC: Tom Hanna (Aberdeen University) won the BUSA Lightweight division at the British Indoor Rowing Championships at Birmingham by a 5 second margin. IN the battle of the Boat Race presidents, Andrew Shannon, Cambridge's Scottish president, pulled 6:02, beating his Oxford counterpart (who was in the GB 8 at Athens) by 5 seconds. However there were five Oxford University rowers recording times faster than the fastest Cambridge rower. The bookies will have a field day as always!

22 November

Glasgow University: winners of men's Coxed Fours at Inverness and of the 'head' of antlers - a rather splendid 12-pointer on this occasion.

Each division contained about 50 fours and 40 other boats racing for a time only (including some younger junior fours whose events were not offered: at least one junior club stayed away altogether for this reason). Meanwhile the logistics of boating so many crews did overwhelm the facilities somewhat, resulting in late starts to both divisions. The organisers apologised for not adequately salting the pontoons (icy conditions slowed things down) and competitors must share flack for not starting the boating process early enough. Neither of these factors, however, would have overcome the fundamental issue: the Inverness Fours Head is now such a success that its organising committee have interesting options open to them (indeed some of them were canvassing opinions on the day). Make it a 2 day event like Aberdeen (fours on Saturday, small boats on Sunday) but with no 'time only entries accepted unless/until pontoon number increase? Make it a straightforward fours head with all age classes, excluding the time only small boats to keep numbers manageable? Leave things as they are? Some other option?

In 2005 the SARA regatta calendar shows 2 weekends' head racing in Inverness (unquestionably our best water and which NEVER cancels for weather) , 2 weekends in Aberdeen (which occasionally cancels for weather) and 8 weekends in Glasgow (which, unfortunately, is frequently subject to weather restrictions). The Glasgow event numbers continue to increase: to the Strathclyde University Small Boats Head added a couple of years ago we must now add the St Andrew BC Head, a new event in 2005. How would the Scottish Rowing community respond if Inverness were to offer, say, a dedicated 4s head, dedicated 8s head and dedicated small boats head in Inverness on 3 separate days, particularly if they tied in with build-up to the major heads for the corresponding boat sizes on the Tideway? Food for discussion on this one.

Daniel tops junior trial: well done to Daniel Prescott of Glasgow RC who recorded the fastest J16 1x time in the weekend's GB long distance trial at Boston in Lincolnshire.Full results here

Scottish selection policies, dates, etc: Selection policies for both juniors and seniors will be published mid-December. Seniors may want to take note of the following dates-

• 5/6 February Senior training camp - Inverness
• 26/27 March Senior Men training w/end - SCP
• 2/3 April Senior Women training w/end -SCP

Senior selection policy will be very similar to the 2004 policy. Invitation to the above weekends will be based on performances at the autumn heads and submitted 2k erg times. When the policy is produced the team manager will be asking coaches/clubs to put forward suitable candidates who will be aiming for HIR selection and who wish to attend the training weekends.

Retro-Kit supply: members of the 2004 team who have kit orders outstanding (no doubt resulting from over-enthusiastic kit-swopping with the oppo on the day!) should note that Gary Bain will have these orders at Glasgow Fours Head this Saturday.

19 November

Glasgow Fours Head - entries close this Sunday: full details are on the Glasgow Rowing Club web site, complete with nifty on-line and fax-based entry systems. Entries close at 5.00pm this Sunday.

Inverness Fours Head - the FINAL start order! This Saturday's event at Inverness has grown like Topsy, once entries which were mislaid got reincorporated. With over 190 entries in two divisions, Inverness have introduced special safety rules which all competitors must obey (a good start would be to read them now!). These arrangements focus principally on ensuring safe separation of boats after the finish: you can safely assume that breaking these traffic rules is quite likely to result in your 'great row' turning into a 'disqualified with no time taken'. So much for the lecture (Inverness did ask me to make the points very firmly): here are the start orders for Division 1 and Division 2 (link corrected: if you're still getting the wrong document it's coming from cache on your computer. Force refresh by holding down 'shift key' while clicking refresh). It's a great entry and I wish you all a great race.

16 November

2005 Regatta Calendar now up: as some of you may know, I had problems with links on the 2004 calendar (contracted on-line MRSA?). Happily, now sorted for 2005. The full Scottish calendar, with added dates of some big events outside Scotland of interest to Scottish rowers, is now up. Links will be added as event posters/draws/results become available (if you;re an event organiser, please keep me posted). You can reach the page here or by clicking the 'Events & Results' link in the header bar of any current page on the site.

Don't want the page to try to become a complete bible of world rowing events, but if there are events that Scottish clubs regularly enter which I have missed out, do drop me a line (with date and link if poss) and I'll consider adding them.

Aberdeen Asset Inverness Fours Head start order: massive entry for this Saturday (181 crews in two divisions) and Inverness have elected to get a provisional draw out early to allow time to sort any errors. The draw is here; any howls of anguish about crews missed out, wrongly classified or whatever, please refer urgently to the race secretary, Ken Sinclair. In view of the high entry and the increased winter business at Jacobite Cruises, the Essential Information for Competitors is absolutely vital: it will tell you exactly where to put (and NOT put!) your trailer, car, etc.

Boating facilities at Inverness are very limited: arrive early, register early and boat early is the best advice. Hopefully the continuing trend of increase in participation at major events in Inverness, allied to growth in the host club, will soon create the critical mass of demand which will unlock the funding to develop the site more fully.

15 November

Aberdeen University, winners of open Men's 4+ by 2 seconds over Aberdeen BC.

First record to go was for participation - 181 crews raced over the 4 divisions. In the Fours Head, new course record times were set in M J15 4+ (George Heriots), M J14 4+ (Aberdeen Schools), W R1 4+ (Robert Gordon University), and W J14 4+ (Aberdeen Schools).

In the Small Boats and Coxed Quads Head the new records were set in M R2 2- (Aberdeen University), M R2 1x (Aberdeen BC), M J14 2x, M J12 2x, M J14 4x+ and M J12 4x+ (4 records all set by George Watson's), W R2 2x (Aberdeen BC), W J14 2x (Strathclyde Park RC), W J16 1x (George Watson's) and W J14 4x+ (Strathclyde Park).

Surprisingly, given that the Aberdeen races are run on a winding tidal river where 'local knowledge' really tells, this means that almost half the course records are held by visiting clubs. Indeed 18 of the the weekend's 40 wins went to visitors.

Small army musters to plan FISA Masters 2005 at Strathclyde: the FISA Masters Commission visited Strathclyde Park from Friday to Sunday to inspect facilities and audit progress on plans for the world's largest regatta which is to be hosted at Strathclyde Park from 6-11 September 2005.

Zdena Narkova (centre right) gets to the point with (centre) Tone Pahle, Ron Chen and Peter Morrison together with some of the team leaders from the local organising committee.

All team leaders, led by SARA president Mary Massaro, attended for the meeting chaired by FISA Masters Commission chairman Peter Morrison who was accompanied by fellow commissioners Zdena Norkova (Czech Republic), Tone Pahle (Norway) and Ron Chen (USA).

Aside from the well publicised investment in course infrastructure, which will see next year's regatta take place on a full 8 lane championship course, the meeting reviewed plans not only for racing but also for the ‘row show', construction of a 400+ seater grandstand for spectators and an imaginative programme of social events. Details of these and links to the on-line accommodation bureau (which is already taking bookings) are on the FISA Masters 2005 web site

If the 'Golden Eight' from California, USA who I met in Hamburg are reading this, one highlight was the announcement that far from eliminating the H2 category (as some had feared) the Commission plans to formalise it as a new category, I, average age over 75 yrs.

At the conclusion of the meeting, FISA pronounced themselves to be well pleased with the preparedness and energetic commitment of the local organising team and confident, on that basis, that the 'Masters faithful' who travel from all over the world to compete in each year's regatta in expectation of something special, would not be disappointed in Scotland in 2005.

11 November

Vacancy - Part Time SARA Administrator: as part of the development plan for the sport, SARA is to employ a part time administrator based at the National Rowing Academy at Strathclyde Park The advertisement (which will appear in the press this weekend) is here together with a detailed job specification and application form.

10 November

200 entries for Aberdeen 'International' Fours and Small Boats Heads. Start order now up. Crews from the Societe Nautique du Perreux near Paris provide a true international flavour to this Saturday's Aberdeen Fours Head - also Marlow appear in some crew names, so Englandshire gets in on the act too. I understand the ABC Langley crew in Div 1 is a first race since 2002 for the Aberdeen crew which won the Wyfold at Henley and took silver and bronze Commonwealth medals that year: there are mutterings of decaying bodies and rusty technique, so giant-killing may be on the cards. Healthy entry from the universities, for whom this is the first round of their Winter League.

The umpire strikes back: the annual umpires' meeting took place on Monday in Stirling. It's always handy for competitors to know what dominated the discussion - as it also tends to be what the umpires are then most 'on the look-out for' in the coming year.

Safety was undoubtedly the top theme: although umpires aren't responsible for safety (crews are), the umpires' beady eye will be upon you from long before you get afloat with a view to preventing hazardous situations from developing; makes sure your equipment is up to scratch and all members of your crew competent. For event organisers, make sure you have your ducks in a row by way of risk assessments, emergency plans, safety advisers etc: you are likely to be asked by senior umpires to show that these exist and have been communicated to team members and crews where appropriate. Conduct of crews and coaches was another theme. Abusive language (wherever directed), coaching from the bank (which is against rules in all racing, including heads) and other forms of unsporting conduct will be dealt with robustly, quite possibly by summary disqualification.

As participation in the sport grows and events get larger, umpires are clearly of the view that sound organisation and firm application of the rules which support safe and fair competition become ever more important. Hard to disagree.

Glasgow Fours Head. Full details for this year's Glasgow Fours Head on 27th November are now up on the Glasgow RC web site. A challenging river on which to organise a head or steer a head but definitely, for my money, one of the most interesting. Glasgow is the third event in the University Winter League series (the second being Inverness Head on 20th November (for which entries close this weekend)

8 November

Fullers Fours Head results: Aberdeen University were fastest Scots (115th overall, 6th in S2 4+) with Clyde 157th overall, 21st in S2 4-. Feast of opportunity for pundits looking for Boat Race form, with Cambridge majoring on the 4- class and coming 1st, 2nd, 3rd and 6th but with Oxford (Isis) getting a 4th place in 4- to add to their 1st and 2nd placings in the 4+ events. Make of it what you will . . .

SARA Coaching Conference: the detailed timetable for this event (4th-5th December at Strathclyde Park) is no up, together with the application form for places

SARA AGM Report: Paula Radcliffe wasn’t the only one involved in a marathon yesterday! In fact Paula’s winning time in New York (2hrs 23min 10sec) was considerably quicker than the time taken for yesterday’s SARA AGM (approx 4 hrs 20min). Joking aside, here is an (unofficial) summary.

The secretary got the meeting off to an interesting start by handing his resignation to the president and leaving just minutes before the scheduled kick-off. Happily, the absence of the secretary didn’t seem to compromise the smooth running of the meeting.

As committees took questions on their reports, the Race Control proposals (Sandy Walker) for a 1st August start date for licence applications extending into the following year (currently 1 Sept) and for the introduction of ‘Day Tickets’ were approved. Regatta Organising, National Rowing Academy and National Coach’s reports contained no motions and were ‘read in’.

The Scotland Team Manager’s report (Gary Bain) reported a promising start by a young senior team at HIR 2004, upon which he hopes to build, but recognised a poorer performance by the junior team, possibly down to an overly-narrow pool of talent upon which to draw. Gary commented that the usual £3000 sportscotland grant to the team ends in 2004 putting further financial pressure on selected athletes to fully fund their own privilege of representing Scotland. The subject of funding for the Scotland team was to be a repeated theme (suggestions of sponsorship? A levy on clubs or members? Other sources?)

The Treasurer's report and accounts were adopted.

Aberdeen Asset’s sponsorship of Rowing Action comes to an end this year: the magazine is actively seeking a new sponsor.

All elections to the SARA Executive were unopposed following withdrawals by nominees previously on the meeting papers:
- Vice President (3 years) – Iain Somerside
- Treasurer (3 years) – Ronnie Goldie
- Ordinary Members (1 year) – Jonathon Cowie, Jim Ferguson, Mike Yeomans

The president thanked the continuing and outgoing members of the 2003-04 Executive for their work.

On amendments to the constitution, the Aberdeen BC proposals to have club voting at the AGM proportionate to the number of racing licences issued through each club (i.e. 100 licensed competitors = 100 votes, 10 licensed competitors = 10 votes) were withdrawn when the extent of opposition became clear. The club’s motion for the past president to serve only 1 further year on the Exec (currently 3), however, was passed with support of both the current Exec and the clubs. The proposal for SARA officers elected unopposed to require to seek re-election after 1 year fell.

The Regatta Calendar for 2005 was approved after a frustrating flurry of late bids for changes and swaps of dates – perhaps some of these could have been passed to the Race Control Convenor in advance of the meeting?

The St Andrew BC resolution that the Regatta Organising Committee should notify clubs of changes under discussion in advance and not simply at the proposal stage was agreed, as were their proposals for Intermediate events at Scottish Championships to be rowed over 2000m (Novice stay at 1000m) and for the introduction of Novice 4x+ and Intermediate 2x & 4x at the Championships. The proposal to change the qualifying points for ‘intermediate’ events was remitted for discussion by a working group. The proposal for free access for the Team Manager to Academy boats for trials and training weekends was rejected, but the proposal for free access for squad crews after Scottish Championships (when fleet usage is low) was adopted.

The Aberdeen BC proposal to restore the determining date for Novice status at Scottish Championships to 1st January was adopted, but the proposal to fix the licence fees at the Half Yearly General Meeting fell.

The Regatta Organising Committees (ROC’s) proposals for the restructuring of Scottish Rowing Championships events to take account of the complex decisions minuted at the preceding AGM and Half Yearly looked doomed from the moment, at the start of yesterday’s meeting when, at the request of St Andrew, these earlier minutes were corrected to show that the 5 key motions which had driven the ROC’s review had been withdrawn at those earlier meetings, not adopted as recorded in the draft minutes. The ROC was ‘thanked for its work in preparing the proposal’, which I suspect (given the confusion over the minutes which drove the review) was a tactful way of apologising to them for having been sent on a wild goose chase.

The Executive proposal recognising the benefits of a One Stop Plan supporting rowing structures UK wide was adopted, as was the outline 4-Year Development Plan (with riders from the president that there would inevitably be detail to be developed and amended within the outline). The Aberdeen BC proposal that the period of ‘meaningful consultation’ on the plan be continued until at least the Half Yearly Meeting was moved down the agenda and then taken without a vote.

The Executive proposal for a Participation Register, which was combined with an associated fee structure to raise new association revenues, fell: because of the ‘multi-purpose’ nature of the motion, it is impossible to say conclusively whether the rejection was because of opposition to a register in principle, concern over data protection considerations in its implementation, or opposition to the associated new revenue-raising proposals. I’ll leave it to your club delegates to tell you their interpretation.

Racing Licence fees were set at Cadet - £6; Junior - £15; Student - £19; Senior - £25.

The Executive was overwhelmingly instructed by the meeting to oppose the proposals for change to the events comprising the Home International Regatta. The changes would have seen the elimination of all eights racing, reduction of lightweight participation to one sculler, and the withdrawal of a number of Junior events to make way for new Junior 15 events.

The proposal for a Development League was remitted to a working group, a briefing on developments in Child Protection left clubs in no doubt that ‘doing nothing is not an option’ (but that advice and support is available through SARA child protection officer Peter Morrison). Bob Neil canvassed for more volunteers to assist in delivering the FISA Masters Regatta in 2005, and Iain Somerside (director of the National Rowing Academy) drew attention to the SARA Coaching Conference in December (full details and application forms here).

The meeting was adjourned around 5.20pm and the weary delegates dispersed.

5 November

St Andrews University Regatta cancelled: apologies for omitting this yesterday. Unfortunately, St Andrews University received too few entries to make their planned regatta at Forfar tomorrow viable

There'll be fireworks . . . ! Not, as you might think, a forecast of the atmosphere at Sunday's SARA AGM (!), just that today is 5th November. Enjoy yourselves safely: for those in Aberdeen, I know there is an organised display at Aberdeen Boat Club (7.30pm) at which I'm sure all members of the rowing community would be very welcome. If any other clubs are holding events, drop me a line and I'll happily do a wee plug.

4 November

Aberdeen Asset 'Inverness Fours Head': Saturday 20th November. If you want to say you rowed the fours head season in Scotland this year, you can't really NOT go to Inverness: it's the fairest water with no excuse for clashes and no advantage for home crews through knowing the best line at awkward bends or bridges. The poster/events offered/postal entry form is here, with local rules. There is also an on-line entry system on the Inverness RC web site.

3 November

Core Stability: the core stability follow-up to the recent GB Rowing Technique seminars at the Academy and in Aberdeen takes place this Sunday in the National Rowing Academy from 10.00am to 12.00 noon: all those who attended either GB Technique event are invited to attend (free) the session, which will be delivered by SARA Physio, John Dennis. Those planning to attend are asked to email Iain Somerside.

AGM reminder: a reminder that the SARA Annual General Meeting of clubs takes place this Sunday at 1.00pm in the National Rowing Academy at Strathclyde Park. Full papers for the meeting, including motions to be voted on and details of those standing for office in the coming year, were sent to clubs some time ago. These are not matters in which a club could reasonably say it has 'no interest'(!) - the AGM decisions determine the priorities for the sport in the next year, and who is entrusted with the responsibility of delivering them. Hopefully all clubs will therefore be represented at the AGM.

December issue of Rowing Action: Ailie Ord is keen to receive articles, letters, photographs, advertisements etc for the December issue of the Associations free magazine, 'Rowing Action', by this Saturday 6th November

Avez-vous un bateau? Two French crews from the Paris region are hoping to fly to Aberdeen to compete in the North East Fours Head - but of course Aberdeen-based boats are at a premium on local race day. Gary Bain, who is the crews' contact locally, is keen to hear from any club who would be willing to bring an extra four to the Aberdeen event (better yet if you could provide a cox, which also gives you comfort over the safety of your boat). Contact Gary by email, and a reminder that details for the Aberdeen Fours Head (Saturday 13th November) & Aberdeen Small Boats Head(Sunday 14th November) are on the Committee of the Dee web site.

Scottish Indoor Rowing Grand Prix

Dalziel High School, Motherwell, Sunday 23 January 2005