During the week of the Commonwealth Regatta, August 2nd-8th 1999, the English women's lightweight quad crew sent back reports to the Rowing Service. We thought you might like to read them...
Thanks to Victoria(the main typist), Becky, Naomi and Helen.
Update 9.
Dear All,
Well, that was it. A most remarkable day, reflections on which will probably follow in the final Update #10. It has been rather intensive all day - much rushing to the toilets and trying to relax without thinking about racing. There have been a number of funny moments - Mum failing to open hercar window when trying to inform the race course official who we were (again, we knew who we were, so we shut up) - all she managed to do was clean the windows, switch on all the lights and explode the air bag. The patient lady in the sentry box waved us through, fully understanding of thelimitations of foreigners with these fancy North American ve-hicles.
But you don't want to hear about that - you want to know the results. Well, this is the best we can do (and it is incomplete) as we were a little busy with our own racing. The results for today were as follows:
LW1X: 1st Canada, 2nd Australia, 3rd New Zealand, 4th England, 5th ScotlandLM1X: 1st Australia, 2nd Scotland, 3rd Northern Ireland, 4th EnglandHM4+: 1st Canada, 2nd England, 3rd ScotlandLM4X: 1st Canada, 2nd England, 3rd Wales, 4th Northern IrelandLW2-: 1st Scotland, 2nd England (only two entries)HW4-: 1st Australia, 2nd South Africa, 3rd Canada I, 4th Canada II, 5th EnglandLW4X: 1st Canada, 2nd England, 3rd Northern Ireland, 4th Zimbabwe
Apologies for the incomplete report. In addition we do know that the HW4X England crew won a silver, the England HM8+ had an amazing silver (scratch crew) and the England HW8+ came fourth with a very very respectable race indeed against super oppo. We do not have anything further at the moment aswe were a tad busy being defibrillated following our own race, details of whichwill be shared (and inflated) over a number of eclairs in the near future.
Message from Mum to all who know: the crew went like shit orf a shovel. You have no idea how happy we were to hear those words. This goes hand in hand withher earlier ringing endorsement: "you're not going to be bollocks" - and she was right. We were 4 secs off the Canadians and never stoppedhaving a go all the way - considering our numerous troubles, woes and besnottedcrew members, we felt we had earned our McDonald's this evening - and enjoyed throwing it all over the car on the way home.
Apologies for the disjointed ramblings - we are tired and emotional and off to see Niagara Falls tomorrow at the crack of a sparrow fart. So we must to bed and dream of a different coloured medal.......
Thank you for all your e:mails and messages - we have loved every one of them - and owe a particular apology to the kind reporter who turned up from the UWO to ask a few questions (stimulated by these disjointed ramblings) - but we never made it in the post race chaos. Please drop me a line and wecan talk rubbish privately another time.
The (former) lightweight Chickadees