It was a good race and I’m proud of the crew. For a while it was looking like everything was going to go against us.
Based on the weather forecast, the decision had been made to use the shortened course, which we felt would make everything a lot tighter. We had just watched our Novice men and women lose to Trinity above the weir an hour earlier. Backing onto the start at Sean O’Casey bridge, we then heard that our Senior Women had lost aswell. The momentum seemed to be with Trinity.
Our warmup had gone well however and a couple of excellent practice starts had boosted our confidence. Also, mentally we knew that it fell to us to prevent Trinity getting a clean sweep, something we were determined we would not let happen.
In almost every race I have had against Trinity over the years, they have gotten out of the blocks ahead and so we were anticipating their same quick start. As expected, they were off fast and hard but we kept our heads when we went down by a quarter of a length, trusting that if we rowed to our own strengths, we would come through.
The previous week had been the National Squad Trials, where 7 of our 8 were trialling - not ideal preparation for the Gannon Cup. The whole crew had travelled down to Cork and training was arranged around the trials. During these short evening sessions, we had focussed on developing a strong stride and rhythm and it was this training which paid off in the rolling conditions on the course.
Coming into the half-way mark, we were up by almost three quarters of a length but passing the MV Cill Airne, Trinity put in a very strong push and we were into the deciding point of the race. Trinity had pushed back to just 2 seats down and our blade tips were getting very close. As we were trying to hold their push, we were also getting warned by the umpire. This could have rattled us but we kept our heads and we pushed on again just when theirs was beginning to fade, regaining our lead.
Now with just 500 metres to go, we were in a controlling position and began to relax and lengthen out a bit more, opening up a lead of a length by the finish.
It was a great race and I would like to extend congratulations to Ali and the Trinity crews for their successes in the other races.
I would also like to thank the Dublin Docklands Development Authority and Buitoni Pasta for their sponsorship of the event on behalf of all at UCD Boat Club.
