Shanklin Sandown Rowing Club had a promising day at the Southampton Coastal Fours Head, held on the River Itchen. Ran by Southampton ARC the event covers the regular Southampton head race course of about 5K from Riverside Park to the Itchen Bridge.
Shanklin had a small entry of just two crews, but were hopefully of some promising results. This proved to be the case as the Ladies Novice Four proved in only their second ever race. Hannah Pain, Stella Gamble, Emily Andre, Emily Faithful and cox Alex Robertson had a fantastic row in their event, with a clean performance right down the course to earn an excellent sixth place finish in a very strong field.
This performance was complimented by that of the J16 Quad. Henry Mudge, Joe Robertson, Jamie Gamble, Daisy Faithful and cox Anja Bennett knew they had a close race with Westover after they were just 12 seconds adrift at the Stour. With a storming performance the crew motored down the course, and despite having to contend with stubborn traffic from other clubs recorded a fantastic time. Agonisingly this time was four seconds slower than that of the Westover crew, nothing however takes away from a great performance.
The head race was also the first chance the club had to use the new van, complete with its new roof rack. The work done to the van was thanks to the tireless efforts of vice captain James Thompson, club captain John Forrest, club president Ian Thomas and the support of Advance Automotive. The project took hundreds of man hours and everyone at the club would like to thank them for their hard graft and the end product.
Some photos courtesy of Jane Maxwell (BTC) check out more of her awesome snaps on her facebook page; https://www.facebook.com/racingsnapsfromjane/?fref=ts