News

Wallingford RC sent 16 Junior crews to Maidenhead Regatta on Saturday 6th August and came back with 9 winners!

Pictured are victorious crews from the morning division including our mixed quad who, racing in the Open Senior event, and with alumna Freya Sharp from Oxford Brookes University on board, dominated their opposition and brought bowman Jasper Tidmarsh his first ever pot (having only taken up the sport this year.)

Other notable wins came from Lucy Mead who won not only WJ14 1x but also teamed up with Katie Mellers in WJ15 2x, perhaps the most competitive event of the day. We won events from all age groups currently training at Wallingford, J14 through to J17, and are looking forward to our final two summer regattas before winter training kicks off in September.

Wallingford RC entered 25 crews from all the age groups into this regatta, held on the site of Henley Royal Regatta, and uniquely racing three crews abreast along the Thames.

We had five wins, in WMasC 4x, WJ16 1x, J15 1x, J14 1x and WJ14 2x, not a bad return for the day!

Pictured are our junior scullers with their pots and medals, and the Womens Masters.

Well, nearly new! It’s been at the club for two years but missed its naming ceremony due to the pandemic, so we made up for it today.

It’s a lovely Hudson 2x, funded by the amazing Wallingford-based charity 1155 who organise the town’s fireworks and Santa sleigh, and who support a host of other charitable and community events and infrastructure.

We really appreciate the support from 1155. Pictured here are the club’s juniors adding some colour to proceedings.

Our women masters continued their remarkable winning record at Henley Masters Regatta on 8/9^th July by taking the Women Masters F 8+ title in a composite crew.

Becky Waller, Katie Kapernaros and cox Rachael Haycock powered home their boat to beat a Marlow 8 in the semi-final, then in a tough final beat an American crew from Chinook Performance Racing by just 3/4 length.

A great performance backing up some good wins in major events over the winter.

Our Wallingford Rowing Club juniors got back into their winning ways with two victories at Thames Valley Park Regatta in J15 coxed fours and WJ18 coxed fours.

Special mention to this latter crew for winning in the J18 category with girls aged 14, 15 and 17, and an extra special mention to our Joint Junior Captain Meera Clark for winning her first pot!

All crews made for some excellent, close racing at a lovely, local and friendly regatta.

Wallingford Rowing Club took 33 crews and 25 boats to Reading Amateur Regatta. A well organised regatta, sunny weather and some excellent racing – what more could you ask for?

The club achieved a fine haul of 7 wins across all age groups and both genders. The youngest – our star J14 sculler Lucy Mead – won her singles race in style, even managing to swim across the line in first place in her opening round after capsizing 10 metres from the finish line!

The rest of her races went much more smoothly, and drily. Our oldest, the Women Masters D 8+, overhauled a 16 second advantage from their F class opposition to storm home in first place.

Chris Revell won Open Sculls (band B ) and our junior section continued its fine run of form, taking home a further 4 winners’ medals in J15 coxed 4s, WJ16 doubles, School singles (band B ) and WJ15 coxed 4s.

A great club outing with the usual vociferous Wallingford support on the river bank, and ever onwards and upwards with the success brought to us by our new Directors of Rowing and their coaching programme.

On 2^nd June in glorious sunshine we held a boat-naming ceremony at the club – the first for a while!

This was to honour Katie Greves, who is not only one of our inspirational Directors of Rowing, but also Wallingford’s most successful Olympian, with a silver medal from the eight at the Rio Olympics in 2016, as well as two World Championships medals and a European Championships gold.

The boat, an ex-demo Swift coxed 4, is now named “Katie Greves” and sits below the newly renamed “Matilda” who had been missing her name since she went in for bow-replacement surgery last year.

NSR is one of the most prestigious regattas in the junior calendar.

When was the last time Wallingford won a gold medal? It was in 2012, a sorry record that was smashed at the weekend by the victorious WJ15 4+ of Tabby Gauden, Zara Richardson, Annie Collins, Martha Hudson and cox Katie Mellers. They dominated the field of 25 entries in the morning time trial, then went out and dominated the A final, winning by over 4 seconds. This crew won at Wallingford and Thames Ditton Regattas, and are now National Schools Champions! 

There were lots of other good performances. Our boys J15 4+ produced an impressive, aggressive row in the time trial, finishing 6^th, then improved on this to come 5^th in the A final. Our J15 4x+ won their B final with ease in a time that would have won a medal in the A final, and our J14 4x+ were an encouraging 4^th in their B final, finishing 10^th out of 35 entries in their first major side-by-side race.