In the main, the first day of racing was a good one for US crews, at least the fourteen which actually got to start racing--there are a few, even in the bigger eights events, waiting until Thursday.
Who Moved On All 8 US University squads in the Temple: Colgate, Cornell, Harvard, Princeton A and B, Syracuse, Virginia, and Washington, as well as Deerfield and Marin in the PE for junior eights.
Who Went Out Green Lake, Greenwich, and St. Joe's Prep in the PE; Seattle Scullers in the Fawley for Jr Men's Quads
You can watch race by race replays here, and check in here to read the Regatta's notes on the full breadth of the eighty Tuesday races.
On the Wednesday
We'll share some details and color from the Banks below, but since racing is already well underway as this Tuesday report hits, here are some of the races we'd recommend catching from the Wednesday on the livestream, or perhaps via replay if you missed it:
8:10 am EDT - Newcastle vs Princeton in Island (College W8+)
10:00am EDT - Princeton A vs Cambridge in Temple (College M8+)
10:35am EDT - Pennsylvania B vs Edinburgh in Island (College W8+)
11:20am EDT - Shrewsbury vs Marin in PE Cup (JM8+)
12:30pm EDT - Princeton B vs Oxford Brookes A in Temple (College M8+)
And then this block of 'lunch-break' racing at midday back in the States:
1:20pm EDT - Cornell vs Durham in Temple (College M8+)
1:30pm EDT - Deerfield vs Shiplake in PE Cup (JM8+)
2:00pm EDT - Isis vs Washington in Temple (College M8+)
In all, twenty-eight US crews see action on Wednesday, plus rising Princeton sophomore--and GB native--Marcus Chute, who may well be one of the youngest scullers ever to race the Diamond Sculls. Chute rowed on into the elite singles field in the qualifier last week.
'It's the Gong Show Out There'
That was one veteran observers take on the spectacle of the Tuesday morning practice session: with the Luncheon and Tea Interval practices reserved, mostly, for crews racing on the day, that meant 5 days worth crews hit the water virtually at once before the Day 1 racing started:
Add in one or two folks doing the "hold on, I have to fix my foot stretchers" routine, and it is a wonder we saw only near-collisions.
That included one junior boy's quad doing a full-on emergency stop mid power-ten, when a whole eight stopped dead ahead of them yelled, "Hey, Quad!!"
Race of the Day
Still seems hard to believe that we all watched this one on a Tuesday and not in a weekend semi or final, but Eton's effort to hold off a very aggressive, and quick, Greenwich crew was an epic fixture, even if the draw consigned it to a Day 1 affair:
This is what racing at Henley is all about
- Henley Royal Regatta (@HenleyRegatta) June 27, 2023
Greenwich Crew and Eton College giving it everything towards the line ?? #HRR23 pic.twitter.com/cm1RcOF13U
Watching one of the best UK school crews face off against a top US junior club was, of course, supposed to be feature of this year's PE, so in that sense we did not have to wait long, but the racing--and the times put up by both crews--were worthy of a later round for sure: Eton's time was just two seconds off the University of Washington's time in the very next race.
Quirks of the Draw
Whether Eton vs Greenwich was a feature or a bug of The Draw, it certainly was not the only "quirk" in the way the slips came out of the Grand Challenge Cup last Saturday. Here's a few we noticed in the row2k newsroom:
And that is even before we get to the fact that the Princeton women, one of the top three NCAA teams this year, will be seeing the GB National Team eight in their first round race--instead of getting selected or just treated mercifully--just a few years after getting over here just to find their first round opponent was the US National Team eight.
At least this time, the Tigers won't be facing a crew they share a lake with back home, as was the case in that Princeton Univ v Princeton Training Center fixture.
The real problem of course is the lack of a Ladies Plate-equivalent women's eight event that would let accomplished college women's crews race other accomplished college women's crews instead of national teams - though notably there are no US men's eights entered in the Ladies, so the incentive for the regatta to add it may be mixed.
The main issue is that U23 medalists cannot row in the Island (the Temple equivalent), and U23 medalists abound in US varsity women's eights. A mitigating factor could be the much larger relative size of collegiate women's rowing, at least in the US, could lead to more interest in a 'women's Ladies.'
Who is Who
Always a fun topic in the Boat Tents in the run-up: who is actually in the crews entered here? We are still sorting that out the old fashioned way--via chit-chat--but for today it is worth knowing the tent talk on these crews today:
Princeton's A crew in the Temple is the national champion lightweight 1V, with three guys from the also gold-medal winning lightweight 2V aboard, while the B crew is a combination boat with five heavyweights in the stern and another three guys from the Tigers Lights 2V in the bow.
Across the men's college eights, Cornell might be the most complete varsity crew from the bigger teams. The Big Red is missing only one guy from their IRA petite finalist 1V
Harvard is a young crew, Washington young-ish: Harvard with six freshmen, a junior and a senior; and Washington with three sophomores and a freshman, along with three seniors and a junior.
In the women's Island event, Georgetown Women's eight is also a heavyweight/lightweight combo crew; Radcliffe B is their Lightweight Varsity; Texas' crew is most of their 2V and Princeton's crew is 2V-ish, as the 1Vs from those schools race in the top tier women's event, the Remenham.
A Henley First
A couple firsts: Llandaff Rowing Club, besting King's School, Chester, earned the distinction of the first club with a win--or the first Welsh club, which does leave another first on the table but it will have to be next year: no English club crews made it through Qualifying in the PE Cup this year.
The Marin junior men became the first US club team to win a race in the formerly schoolboy-only PE Cup. Marin beat Dulwich and sees Shrewsbury today.
Only at Henley Experience
One element of Henley racing is going to the line to race a crew you really know very little about. For overseas crews, this often includes facing a school or team you have never even heard of, let alone seen before on the race course.
We asked Colgate 3 seat Colin Clark about what it felt like to line up against an unknown crew, just minutes after the senior team captain helped his crew win their round one race against Imperial College, London.
"You just use the mentality that every race could be your last, so you get after it as much as you can so there's no regrets," Clark said. "A bunch of us are seniors and who knows if we'll be back at Henley all that soon. So the goal is to enjoy every race and, if you go as hard as you can, you won't regret anything."
In the race, which is worth a watch, Imperial stormed back to eat away most of Colgates lead, but Clark and his crewmates held fast to keep their bow and then pull away to win by three-quarters of length.
The mindset in those crucial moments, Clark said, was about "keeping the momentum in our favor."
"They had a really good middle base there, so we were trying not to get frantic and just stay in control. We knew that if we got to the last 500 and we still had an advantage, we have a really strong sprint.
"You could feel the boat pick up and surge at the end there. There certainly was that cushion that was going away, but I think we've all been rowing together for long enough that we have a lot of trust with each other."
Colgate's next opponent? Not really an unknown at all: the Raiders get Syracuse, from just down the road from home in Upstate New York and, yes, the two schools saw each other in the heats at the IRA.
Useful Bit of American Slang
When challenged for a quote upon wandering into the press box--a great perch which had, of course, been unguarded all week until racing started--one of the scullers from the Dutch U23 quad, shrugged and said the trick to going where you aren't allowed is as simple as:
"Fake it till you make it."
The Dutch U23 quad later saw off Reading University by a length in the evening session Tuesday and earned themselves a day off before facing a Danish quad next. No telling where they will wander today.
Knowing Your Monarchs
The King shells rented out to crews here all have the names of British Kings, fittingly enough:
Certainly no shortage of names, or Roman numerals, to go around there--and sure beats rowing in a no-name rental.
And who got the newest King's moniker? That would be the Winter Park girls, rowing in the 'Charles III' shell.
Don't Drink the (River) Water
A recent sewage discharge into the Thames created some good headlines and ledes--along with, of course, some valid health concerns--and you really can't beat a British tabloid when it comes to covering poop:
Posh Henley Regatta rowers warned to watch out for turds while on 'unsafe' Thames
Luckily rowers don't get in the water much during racing, but they have been know to do some river swimming in their down-time, so here is hoping no one gets too ill.
Can't Be Too Careful with the Carbon
Everyone knows that carbon wings are a bit more fragile, but the Canadian Women's Eight takes being super careful to a whole new level:
The coaches of the Tokyo gold medalists held the boat off, at 'riggers length,' while the crew adjusted on the dock, and then Kit herself hopped the gap to get in her seat.
Rooting from Home
What's In A Name? Lapage Edition
We noted that the St. Joe's high school kids were rowing a spare pair named for Harvard Assistant Coach Pat Lapage.
Turns out of course, the shell is from Lapage's school, Shrewsbury, which is rightly proud of their IRA and U23 medal winning Harvard grad--and that the Prep kids had no idea who Lapage was...not until after he walked over, pointed at the name on the shell, and asked, "Do you know who this is?"
Correction: Spare Pairs Race
We regret to admit that we erroneously reported that Marin over St Joe's was the final of the Spares racing--though, to be fair, there is no posted schedule for that event.
We were right about the winners: Marin's duo did take it, but their race against the Prep was a heat. The final was actually against a pair from Syracuse and seems to have involved quite a bit of boom play on the Orange's side of the course. That, of course, is the race we would really like photos and videos of--especially the deft post-dodging that kept the Syracuse pair intact and upright--but another photo of the winners will have to do:
And...The Blazer of the Day
Did you think we forgot? Not a chance:
This is Michael Atalay, wearing the official Princeton Class of 1988 jacket. It is not a Henley blazer, per se--each graduating class at Princeton designs its own version of the alumni jacket on the occasion of their 25th Reunion Weekend--but we are guessing there must have been a rower or two amongst the designers that year.
In the lining, it features the names of all of Atalay's classmates, and in this year when the Tigers and their alums are marking the 125th year of men's rowing, 75th year of light men's rowing and 25th year of women's rowing, he has added this pin to complete the look.
Atalay did his school rowing at St. Andrew's School in Delaware--like his father before him and his children afterwards--and is here with his dad to watch his son race in the Virginia Temple Eight.
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