It was a fabulous day of racing Saturday at the Al Urquia Regatta at Sandy Run Regional Park in Occoquan, despite windy conditions that made for a difficult course. We raced four boats–a women’s varsity 4, a women’s junior 4, a men’s junior 8 and a men’s varsity 4–with two boats qualifying for the finals! This was the most successful team performance for a Hopper crew in many years.
Reported by men’s coach Alan Burch:
“Another competitive regatta for the GDS crew. The men’s junior 8 fought to 4th of 5 in its heat, having held onto 3rd through much of the race. We have not worked on the closing sprint yet in practice and will focus on that more for the May regattas, but it was clear from the shore that the crew left it all out there on the race course and fought hard the whole way. This race will provide much insight into building for further improvement, and the rowers and I were pleased with the effort.
“The men’s first four was also competitive, as we came in 3rd of 4 in our heat, among the official entrants in the race. (There was another boat entered as an exhibition participant.) Like the junior 8, the 4 set a purposely aggressive pace during the body of the race, and this kept them in the hunt, but left them little in reserve for the closing 
sprint. They, too, emptied the tank and fought well. Having qualified for the final by finishing third, they raced again less than two hours later, finishing 6th in the final. It bears noting that the other schools in the finals sent far larger teams to the regatta.
“We also owe special thanks to the Fairfax crew for loaning us a four-oared shell to use in the men’s 4. We needed a separate shell because the regatta’s schedule would not permit us sufficient time for our three four-oared crews to use our one GDS four-oared shell for our three races in four-oared shells. We ended up racing twice in the Fairfax “Slick” and were grateful for that.
“The men come away from Al Urquia with a successful effort that will help them focus more narrowly on the adjustments they need to make to improve, and with the increased confidence of having battled hard.”
Reported by assistant coach Jennifer Werkmeister:
“The women’s junior 4 exceeded all expectations finishing second out of five boats in their heat and qualifying for finals. They got off to a good start and held a fairly aggressive pace through the body of the piece. The work they had done on lengthening their stroke in practice the week before really paid off as they fought another boat for second coming into the last 500. In an excellent execution of the sprint they had worked on in practice, they were able to jack the rate up while maintaining relative efficiency. In the last 500 they opened the gap between them and the third boat for a strong finish in second.
“The women’s varsity 4 was an exhibition boat for us as we had to row one of our rowers in two events. They got off to an aggressive start with a high of 38 strokes per minute and settling at a 32. The rate and power dropped off in the middle of the race, but the girls picked up some speed again in the last 500. Another great sprint closed the gap between the GDS 4 and the boat ahead, bringing it to a close finish with both boats fighting for third. The 4 came in fourth out of five, but was overlapping with the third boat.
“In the junior 4 finals it was clear that the girls had left everything they had out on the water. Again they got off to a good start and held a competitive pace for the first 500 before their energy started to fade. They finished last in the finals, but had proven that they could be very competitive and hold their own with the middle of the pack in this event.
“Over all it was a great day for GDS women. They demonstrated vast improvements in both their blade work and their pacing over races last weekend. Their results are much better than we could have expected based on years past, and we are proud to see the extent to which they pushed themselves on race day.”
See you next Saturday at the WMIRA Novice Championships at Thompson Boat Center on the Potomac in Georgetown, DC.
Fear the Hopper on the Water!
Keven Vance
2014 Crew Club President