Rowed Over
W2 had a solid row up to our start at the penultimate station. Aware that both Corpus W1 ahead and Clare W2 behind had achieved similar times to us at Champs Eights Head a month ago, we were unsure about how our first race would go.
Our nerves were apparent as the boat veered slightly to strokeside off the start and we came out of our winds at rate 45. Despite our excessively high rate we clearly had some decent speed since we immediately started gaining on Corpus and it was clear that Clare (who had just rowed over as sandwich boat in the W3 division) were not much of a threat.
Our first whistle on Corpus came just before the Motorway Bridge followed by a second halfway down First Post Reach. Keen to finish the job off, India called for a Jumps 10 where we took the rate back up to 39 and came close to 3 whistles. With our legs burning after such a rapid start we tired around First Post Corner and Corpus began to pull away from us in the Gut. We pushed out of Grassy Corner but sadly Corpus caught Downing W2 just before Ditton Corner.
We finished the race with a strong row-over, leaving Clare W2 far behind us. The adrenaline is now hopefully out of our systems so we are aiming for a quick bump on Downing W2 tomorrow.