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Imperial at Henley Royal Regatta

Boat Club

Henley Royal Regatta is the climax of the season, one of the only regattas where thousands come to watch, and competing in it is the aim of oarsmen both nationally and internationally. Imperial had one of the largest entries of any club at Henley this year, with one crew in the Fawley Challenge Cup (for junior quads, a composite with Dulwich College), two crews in the Temple Challenge Cup (for university eights), two crews in the Britannia Challenge Cup (for club and student coxed fours), an IC/Queen’s Tower composite in the Visitors’ Challenge Cup (for club and university coxless fours) and a Queen’s Tower crew in the Wyfold Challenge Cup (for club coxed fours). The men were hoping to emulate the ladies, who at the women’s regatta had won the lightweight single sculls, Club coxed fours, and reached the final of the open lightweight coxless fours.

Several of our crews had earned the right to prequalification as a result of earlier successes in the season, leaving our second Temple eight, second Britannia coxed four, and the Fawley Quad to line up for the Henley qualifying time trial on the Friday. Both the quad and eight qualified comfortably with only the second Britannia four missing the required time.

The following Wednesday saw the first day of racing, with comfortable wins for the Britannia and Wyfolds fours. The second Temple eight had drawn Isis, Oxford University’s reserve crew. IC B were not expected to make a close race of it, but a superb start and a sustained burst of speed saw our boys well in front up to the half way point. Unfortunately this could not last for the length of the course and Isis came back to win by just a quarter of a length. The race did not go unnoticed in the national press with excuses flying from the Isis crew.

The first Temple eight also had a tough draw against Trinity College Hartford, an American crew that had been seeded by the Henley Stewards and so was expected to make the finals. IC A were down by half a length after a quarter of the 2.2km course, but this was expected in the race plan the coach Bill Mason had prepared the crew for. The American crew pushed for clear water, but some inspired coxing calls and gritty determination ensured that IC started to pile the pressure on, at which point Trinity started to falter, IC rowing through for a three quarters of a length win. This also earned coverage in the national press:
"One must never underestimate Bill Mason’s Imperial College crews on the Henley course." (Mike Rosewell writing in the Times, Thursday July 05 2001).

Thursday saw all of the remaining crews progress with ease. On Friday we lost the remaining Temple eight (one of only two crews from the UK who made it to the quarter finals in this event), the Wyfold four and the Fawley Quad. This left just the Britannia and Visitors four, both in the semi finals on Saturday. The Brit four raced first, finally meeting a Durham crew who had been strong all season but had yet to race in the top regatta’s down south. Unfortunately in an unexpected result they proved too strong on the day, taking an early lead which IC were unable to recover from. Durham going on to lose in the final, to a crew well beaten by IC just a few weeks earlier. The fairness of the two lanes in the side by side regatta was questioned by many, and not for the first time in the regatta’s history.

The IC/Queen’s Tower crew then raced against an Oxford Brookes/Taurus composite in the grudge match of the regatta. Regrettably on this occasion the poly boys won, using brute strength and the better lane to come past the IC crew in the final section of the race. Thus unusually at this increasingly competitive regatta IC had no crews in the finals, a huge disappointment. Henley was not the last race of the season for some of our members. Pete Holt and Tom Frankum went on to win at the Home Countries International rowing for England in the coxless pairs, Nick Campregher (Franco) won gold at the National Championships in a Junior Double, Alison Eastman collected a bronze at the U23 world championships in the lightweight single sculls and Dan Ouseley (QT) won a silver in the coxed fours. This crew then went on to the senior world championships where they exceeded expectations, coming home with a bronze medal.

We also attended several of the more social regattas over the summer, and the new season has started well with a day spent paintballing (where we trounced all comers) and enlarged squads with keen freshers. The recreational rowing is going well with crews already hitting the water, the novices have started training and the top squad is building up towards the fours head. The freshers party will be held on Friday the 26th of October in the Thames boathouse (next to ours in Putney) and promises to be an excellent event.

Yacht Club

Last weekend saw the start of the year for the yacht club with a weekend of race training and cruising. In a departure from the usual South coast trips two boats were chartered from Shotley Marina near Ipswich. Having left Southside at 6 pm, not realising quite how long it would take to get all the way across London, the two crews arrived just in time to dump their bags on the boats and head off for a few swift pints before closing time.

An early start allowed the racing crew a full mornings training and gave those new to sailing on the cruising boat a chance to find their sea legs. Following lunch the cruisers foolishly decided to challenge the other boat to a race back to Shotley Marina. Despite repeated attempts to confuse the racing crew the cruisers were soundly beaten, though I’m sure if you asked then they would claim otherwise. Sunday morning dawned with more rain but no wind. The racing crew went out to sea determined to get some more training in whilst the cruisers turned the other direction and went up river towards Ipwich. Soon the wind came and both boats had an exiting afternoon’s sailing. Sadly, the boats had to be handed back by 4pm after which we started the long trek back to London.

If anyone is interested in finding out more about the yacht club come along to our meetings at 6pm on Mondays in Southside.

A Good Start All Round

Football

IC VI............................. 2
IC V ............................. 1

It was always going to be a difficult game. Banter prior to the match and the 5th’s superior record in the fixture implied a spanking was on the cards. The 6ths, buoyed by their excellent performance midweek came out explosively, breaking up the "technically" stronger, lard-bucket opposition midfield.

Pieman and Figo put it about and the extremely tight (nice) first half was not helped by reckless challenges from both sides and blatant belly barging by the 5ths. Honours even at the break drew a dutch master of the cool defenders. Tinney must not have been a happy bunny, ‘cause a long team talk brought them out with all guns blazing. Dominating the game for a good 20 mins had no effect though, as they were shut out by a 6th team under the cosh but loving it (as ever).

Then, the turning point. Darius was hacked down from behind 35 yards out which allowed The Beast to step up and use his glorious left foot to swerve, power and lob the ball into the net with a shot that made their giant keeper look 4ft high. WHOOOOHOOOO. Obviously they were hurt by this and their heads dropped, anything they tried was delt with simply and sweetly. The clock ticked down and the pressure on the defence increased to near catastrophic levels but no, denied.

On the break, Richard was cynically hacked down in the box, penalty! Pieman cooly slotted it home and we were in the realms of fantasy.

A consolation goal 5 mins from time gave them hope but the result was never in doubt. The underdogs, the better team, the winners, the undefeated 6th team, the nice guys, will rub this outstanding victory in their faces for some time yet. Claims of luck are quite frankly a bunch of crap, tough shit boys, you got beat fair and square. As man of the match I enjoyed the champers (cheers Rob): can you smell what the Headcase is cooking...

Netball I

Sussex............................ 9
IC I .............................. 11

We started off well, with three umpires as opposed to the usual one! With a new team and new positions, we started well and the scores were more or less level, even through the third quarter blues (which actually came in the last quarter since we only played ten minute quarters instead of the usual fifteen minute ones - woosy I know, but, hey, it was the first match!) Kath did some amazing interceptions, aided by her great new GK, Clare K. WD, Hannah, did well despite recovering from a kidney infection (not alcohol induced at all, eh Hannah?) Saix (sp? I think that alcohol may have had an affect on our reporter’s writing) came on to relieve Hannah, and we were still playing well with Sooz’s (as above) great centre playing and Jess and Beckie’s wonderful shooting (Oh, I’m so modest!) Ruthy-baby was her usual superb self, but what can I say, it was the first match...we did OK! We’ll beat everyone else.

Oh I forgot to mention that we had some great support from Claire F, and Gordon, our Santa coach, and we got soaked!

Netball II

Goldsmiths ........................... 9
IC II .................................... 11

With our first match of the season at home this week you would assume nothing could go wrong, new keen players, new kit and decent weather. As if! Firstly we had no umpire from either side. so it was decided we would play and just use the substitutes as the umpires.

The match was a violent one (as violent as netball gets) but we managed to keep possession of the ball for about 75% of the time, we were only let down by the fact that their side were about 2ft taller than the majority of our players. Once they had the ball at their end there was no way they could miss their shot. We led for the majority of the first half with our shooters (Jen and Lucinda) doing a fantastic job, finishing at half time 11-9.

The second half was when disaster struck. I accidentally (I promise) tripped up the girl defending me and so she went flying along the court straight onto her face, which wasn’t helped by the fact it had been raining. Trying to be brave she quickly jumped up declaring she was fine only to find that she did in fact have a huge lump on her arm, which looked surprisingly like bone. Needless to say she couldn’t continue and with no one left to substitute her position, other than the umpire, the match was abandoned and a draw was declared. Not being bias but I am certain we would have won!

Badminton

Last Wednesday saw the beginning of the defence (for the second year running) of the South Eastern team Championships titles won by the men’s 1st’s and 2nd’s team in their respective conference and trophy leagues last year.

The 1st’s were at home against Brighton who gave us a tough match last year. However having lost their best players they easily succumbed to IC’s obvious dominance and were beaten 8-1, even after an early display of the most muppetish play by our captain Mark and his partner Dave.

The 2nd’s were away at Kings, who were clearly not in our league last year. The match took less than an hour to conclude, and IC won most convincingly, finishing 9-0, with a crushing points margin of 270-46.

The ladies were also playing away against St Bartholomew’s. After a disappointing session last year, the ladies were determined to show that they are the best in the league and they did it in style. They won 9-0 as well, and their points margin was even more impressive, thrashing the opposition 270-37.

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