Henley athletes triumph at British Junior Championships

HENLEY Rowing Club juniors were out in force at the British Rowing Junior Championships last weekend where 25 crews ranging from J14 to J18 raced over the three-day event which was shortened due to the extreme heat.

Semi-finals and repechage were eliminated and crews went straight from time trials to finals, first six crews in time trial to final A, crews seven to 12 to final B and so on.

Overall the Henley junior girls brought home two golds (WJ18 4x- and WJ16 4x-), five silvers (WJ14 4x+, WJ16 1x, WJ16 2-, WJ16 4+ and WJ18 8+) and a bronze (WJ18 4-).

Friday saw the racing of the U14 and U15 crews including the J14 single sculler, Felix Richardson who won the C final by three seconds. The J15 double of Arun Mahey and Viggo Gibbons won the E final and the double of Zac Jenkins and Jacob Len came fourth in a tight A final with the first four crews finishing within two seconds of each other.

The J14 women had three quads entered with the C crew finishing third in the D final, the B crew finishing fifth in the A final and the crew of Jemima Painter, Chloe Hughes, Molly Hall, Jemima Butterworth coxed by Florence French finishing second and picking up the first Henley medal of the weekend. The J15 women doubles finished third in the B final and sixth in the A final with the JW15 quad finishing fifth in the B final.

On Saturday the 16 to 18 years old events began with a 1,500m time trial to select finalists. Samuel Hunter raced in the D final of the J16 single sculls and came third while Sam Pratt finished third in the C final of the J18 1x. Successful in their time trials the previous day, two J16 4x- crews made it to the Sunday finals finishing second in the B final and fifth in the A final.

The first medal of the day came from Anna Merrit in the JW16 1x who made an impressive sprint from third to second to claim the silver. She was followed by Laoise O’Donohue in the JW18 1x who finished a respectable fifth in a strong A final. The JW16 pair of Sophie Eltze and Emily Simmons raced hard to the line and picked up another silver, shortly after the JW18 8+ of Amelia Sterjo, Sophia Spanswick, Keira Delaney, Abilene Artherton, Blair Fitzgerald, Ella Dickson, Emma Eltze and Lucy Jones coxed by Caitlin Emery put out a solid performance for a crew who had rowed together just once prior and raced to silver.

The double sculls of Tabitha Hall and Freya Weiser won the JW162x B final comfortably and the double of Matilda Macartney and Gwennie Hunter raced up an age group and finished a strong fourth in the B final of the JW18 2x.

The JW16 4+ of Ruby Rodger, Daisy Janes, Emily Simmons, Sophie Eltze coxed by Matilda Ley led their race to halfway but were beaten to the gold by a strong Scottish crew from Glasgow Academy who Eltze and Simmons had raced earlier in the pairs. Anna Merrit and Ella Dickson teamed up for a second final of the day each in the
JW18 2-, and having raced hard already that morning the duo managed fourth place.

The JW16 B 4x- of Evie Bell, Ella Smith, Sophie Freudenberg and Francesca Reeves won the B final by 11 seconds while the A quad of Florence Lenthall, Sophia Spanswick, Emma Eltze and Freya Weiser raced a strong field and won the first gold medal for Henley.

The JW18 4x of Matilda Macartney, Gwennie Hunter, Tabitha Hall and Laoise O’Donohue set off a ferocious start rating 36 for the first half of the race and leading the field to an impressive seven-second victory. In the final race of a scorching day, the coxless four of Blair Fitzgerald, Abilene Artherton, Keira Delaney and Lucy Jones, who had also raced in the first race of the day, showed their strength to row from fifth to third in the second half of the race to get a final bronze medal. This was a strong performance from a talented group of athletes that rounded off the season for most of the junior athletes from Henley and was also a final Henley junior appearance for Laoise O’Donohue and Blair Fitzgerald.

Ailish Harkin and Pippa Jamieson will race for GB at the coupe de la Jeunesse in Spain next month while Tabitha Hall and Anna Merrit have been selected to row for England at the home international regatta tomorrow (Saturday).