The Great River Race
The weather “back home” may not be a patch on last years journeying , but there is plenty here to keep us amused whilst it rains. One such event is the Bursledon regatta , and this year saw me being shanghied as a last minute replacement into one of the rowing gigs doing the Boatyard Sheave – the long race that starts it all off. We managed to sneak a win over the youngsters and in the post race anoxia hatched a plan to combine for the Great River Race. Only later did I learn that it involves rowing 22 miles on the tidal Thames – from Greenwich to Richmond!
More a festival of traditional boats and fixed seat rowing than a race , the GRR is a wonderful spectacle with competitors coming from as far afield as the Western Isles of Scotland , the west coast of Ireland , coastal Wales , a large contingent from Holland ,and of course 30 or so Pilot Gigs from the West Country . On top of this there are increasing numbers of traditional Thames skiffs and Watermans gigs , as well as georgeous ceremonial barges , so for the traditional boat enthusiast its like landing in heaven . Our craft was a Bursledon gig – originally a Falmouth working boat 15 ft long and so hardly a speed machine – and with 3 oarsmen and the obligatory cox and passenger , very hard work as she was constantly restricted by her short waterline length to a maximum of 5 knots , with any further increase in speed obtained only by massive effort.
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The race is run as a pursuit , with the slower boats starting first . Our slot was 19 minutes after the start , and by Westminster bridge we had weaved our way through the fleet to be in 4th place , but the first 3 were nowhere to be seen. By Fulham we had overtaken a couple of girls rowing beautifully in a skiff not unlike Kingfisher and from then on it was a lonely struggle against the wind. With 5 miles to go a quad sculled curragh with 4 massive men at their strange “needle” oars were getting ominously close , and despite us luring them into a mooring buoy we only gained a short respite and they were soon past. At Richmond bridge a dragon boat moving incredibly fast appeared and just short of the line an outrigger canoe swept past leaving us in a credible 6th place ( we never saw 1st and 3rd – two identical 14 foot skiffs) , lying on our oars for a well earned rest and admiring the rest of the 330 boats as they swept past the line.
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Sensibly I recruited two youngsters to pull the sweeps , whilst John Foulkes and myself were to share the sculls in the middle of the boat . In fact we oldies ended up on the sweeps for the last 3 miles which was sufficient to understand the great show George and Ed put up pulling these enormous levers for all those miles.
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The finish was in the semi rural setting of Ham , and I splashed around ( the spring tide had overflowed the banks) with a silly grin on my face surrounded by hundreds of beautiful boats and thousands of like minded enthusiasts with whom to swap tall stories .
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Next year? I can’t decide wether to bring Kingfisher and start at the front or to build a 25 foot gig and try and come through from the back! One thing is for certain , we will do it again!