The Interclubs Regatta

The weather was poor, I'm afraid to say the turn out by most of our paddlers was poor considering that the course is right on our doorstep and from the point of view of the Lightning paddlers, the organisation was disasterously poor. However the performances of those who attended made up for both these factors to some extent.

It was of course mainly veterans and juniors racing and with some outstanding efforts from amongst them we managed to squeeze into 14th place. It seems that the scorekeeping was also poor and a quick check showed that we should have been placed 12th. The matter has been taken up, but so far no response from the organisers.

Our main cause to celebrate is the success of the Lightning paddlers. On the Saturday, our most successful paddlers in both Under 10 & Under 12 boys were denied a final despite much slower paddlers being included. However, they proved their point on the Sunday by producing medal winning performances.

The Lightning efforts, together with their consistent results and considerable participation during the season gave them the Runner Up place in the Lightning Cup. We offer them our congratulations.

Full Results can be downloaded from the Wey Kayak Club website by following links for Sprint then Results. http://www.weykayak.co.uk/

Sorry the weather made photography almost impossible, so no pictures.

Friday evening.

It was an evening for lolling around in an open canoe with a bottle of chilled wine & a few strawberries or something! George's course members seemed to find the cool Trent water inviting and swam instead of paddled around.
Surprisingly there was not a flood of casual paddlers, but there were still a few over energetic paddlers who did Round the Bridges with Norman, in the absence of Dave E, who is currently in Denmark with the National Marathon Team.
The river bank was ringing to the strident tones of Nigel as he tried to squeeze a millisecond or two faster time out of Michael, so The Lightning & Junior group paddled out of earshot to Wilford Church & back, before a few of them were infected with an excess of energy and had a go at Round the Bridges themselves.
The most notable performance was from Megan who took 3 minutes off her Personal Best without any shouting from Nigel. Tadek also gets a mention for a PB, which he managed in near silence!

June Regatta 2007 - Sunday

If anything the weather was even better today. Mixed results, but some good racing. The senior races seemed rather confusing if you bothered to study the programme, as all the crews had been jumbled up. Oh yes, of course, pre-Olympic year & the coaches are raising the axe, stirring the stick, playing the game & trying to get some qualifying times at whatever cost to the individuals. Sound a little cynical? Well nothing's changed, it happens every Olympic cycle. In fact if it didn't happen we would get worried that the coaches didn't care!

At a club level, Kat & Gilly got a few National Championships medals. Tadek came 3rd in the under 12s 500 & Zyggy came first, adding another "tiddly wink" each to their score already in their first ever regatta. The future looks bright!

Considering that it was the senior National Championships, the whole day seemed a little slow. Perhaps it was the hot weather, perhaps it was the absence of the junior Girls D paddlers!

June Regatta 2007 - Saturday

Our best results were marred by carelessness by our veterans, both in individual K1 events & the K2 5km race. Having either won or gained minor placings the two underweight boats also gained us 3 more penalty points. For the paddlers themselves, the disqualifications were just pointless as they should really know better. For the rest of us, the penalty points count against the club score at the Inter-clubs Regatta in September. I can almost forgive the juniors for the ones they gained at an earlier regatta, but Veteran club members with years of experience should really know better.
The lack of the junior girls racing removed some of the more light hearted element of the regatta, but in their absence, Tadek & Zyggy made up for it with a 3rd & a 2nd in their respective 1Km Lightning races.
The 5Km with Marish felt quite hard, especially after my almost decent result in the Masters B K1 100m. I missed the "edge" of having Howard to race against due to his promotion back to Masters A!

Round the Bridges & Junior Group

Perhaps the weather kept people away, but there were only a few people doing round the bridges & several of them were juniors. The junior/Lightning group paddled down to TS Orion before going back to the club to swell the numbers for one times Round the Bridges. Luke, Tadek, Ricky & Ozzy all did PBs. The evening was also punctuated by swimming!

Clifton Time Trial

Although it was sunny, the strong upstream wind made the water fairly choppy for tonight's time trial. It was cold on the fingers too. With Beth C away, all the juniors paddled in K2, either with us old fogies, or together, with the exception of Craig. The 6 minute group seemed to be where the action was, with most of them finishing within seconds of each other.

Worcester Hasler Race

With good weather, Dave driving the mini bus & several good results to NKC, Worcester was an enjoyable day out. Most people were happy with their individual results, but most importantly the team effort meant that we finished 3rd overall in the points.

Photo's by Mick & Sarah - more on the Gallery Blog. (Click on the images for the large version.) Results by following the link on the NKC Results page.

Mick & Tadek getting ready for their 1:30 starts.

Having Dave as driver made the whole day easier for the rest of us.

Division 4 was a good field, with Rex, Graham & Norman all competing. A good result for Rex, finishing 2nd

With the higher divisions racing, Tadek had plenty of help to get him on the water for the Lightning race. 18 competitors across the different catagories made it the best Midlands Region Lightning event so far this year.

A very good result from Tadek, coming first in his class & scoring 10 points in the Lightning competion.

Round the Bridges

Loads of people turned up for last night's Round the Bridges. Well done to Max, Alice and Ralph's sisters (sorry I don't know your names!) for your PBs. I also did a PB and Shob equalled hers twice so it was a good night.

Friday Night "Lightnings"

The weather was mild & dry for the first Friday session of 2007. Some Lightning paddlers chose to do "Round the Bridges" with other juniors, while the rest did a downstream paddle, with a mixture of adults, Lightnings & juniors. There were more than 15 junior/Lightning paddlers in total between the 2 sessions. The river paddle group only managed to get down nearly to the Sailing Club as "splash & run" seemed to be the main game. The adults accompanying the group stayed aloof from such frivolity & so did the girls!

All the Lightning paddlers who did winter sessions were there and so were some of the ones from last summer.

Seniors mainly did Round the Bridges, although there were several independant groups & at least 2 members family groups during the evening. It was good to see so many paddlers on the river for the first full Friday evening session of 2007.