Devils Tails from the Riverbank
The ‘Devils Tails from the Riverbank’ are the collected musings of our Recreational Squad Captain, Ed Sinfield.
They provide a bit more background to what the club gets up to and what was going on in his head at the time.
10 Stourport Regatta – 2019
I started writing this way back at the beginning of August. I’m sorry it’s taken me so long to finish it. It’s like taking a very long trip down memory lane now.
Sunday morning (11th August – see what I mean?). The new day dawns and I’m sitting here at home in my jim-jams, first pint of tea in hand and thinking of the rest of my friends who will all be just in the process of poking their heads out of their tents and camper vans in Stourport-on-Severn (the Birmingham Riviera). I tried to persuade my wife that it’d be a good idea for us to camp too, but she said she‘d find sitting on the bank all weekend watching other people racing boats too boring, so that was that really. She tends to say more or less exactly what she thinks, which can be a good thing – sometimes.
Yesterday (now near the start of last month – Sat 10th Aug) started pretty early for some of us who were riding shot-gun with (chairman) Jim, towing a trailer load of our boats down in time for our first race of the day, which happened to be Jim and I in our double scull. As it happened, we needn’t have bothered because our competition scratched their crew for some reason. They were there but didn’t want to race us. Full Article
9 Holiday Season
I think this should be quite a lot shorter than normal, which will probably be a bit of a relief for you. We’re off on our hols at the moment.
I’ve got another anecdote left over from the recent trip to Lithuania by some of our members. Remember? The ones that toiled all the way back up the raging stream to rescue another crew from their sinking boat? Well, this story concerns the sort of misunderstandings and lost social opportunities that can so easily arise if you don’t talk to people. Full Article
8 Regattas
There’s a tiny bit more to add to the bit in the last issue about the Lithuania trip, but before I do anything about that I think we need to catch up with some Regatta news before I forget it all.
On Sunday 28th April, we took two crews down to race at Leicester Regatta. I can’t say we exactly covered ourselves in glory as both boats were knocked out in the first round: our men’s coxless quad (4x-) lost to Leicester (on their home turf) and the Ladies 4x- lost to Burton Leander (which is a shame – but no shame if you know what I mean). All I will say is, that it’s a very narrow stretch of water for racing down and the wall on the towpath side is a very solid one. I’ll leave you to work out the rest of the story for yourselves. Full Article
7 Devils to the Rescue
I’ve got loads more to tell you about our regattas so far this year, including the left-overs from last edition’s Trentham tale, the (Old) Masters at Holme Pierrepont and the quality and succulence of the bacon cobs at Leicester Regatta, not to mention the story about the narrow boat. However, some of our members have just come back from an ‘away tour’ to Lithuania with a tale worth the telling, so I’m going to do that instead and put off regattas for another couple of weeks. Full Article
6 Transatlantic Regatta Season
I haven’t finished telling you about Julie Paillin yet (one of our two founding mothers). The last time we spoke she’d won three races in as many weeks with her friends from Derwent Rowing Club, which I’ll tell you a bit more about further down with the rest of our regatta reports, if there’s any space left. I’m just back from Trentham Regatta and I caught sight her and Derwent there just as I was leaving. The report back is that she got two wins (in a double scull and composite eight) so she has another two trophies to adorn her walls with. Full Article
5 How the Leopard Got Its Spots
Time for another . . . err . . .exciting episode.
We’ve had a great response for our Learn to Row course with twelve participants signing up for it this year. We had the swimming test and cap-size drills on Saturday 27th April in the swimming pool up at Trent College and we’ll have had our fourth session by the time you read this. The first session always takes a while with introductions, safety instruction and a land-based introduction as to what to do with all your arms and legs when you’re in a boat. Everybody managed to get out on the water for a quick flip up the river past the scout hut and back on that first session but it was dark by the time the last crews came off the water. Full Article
4. The day the Vikings Came
Now then. I’m going to tell you a bit about our Viking Invasion down at Trent Lock because this is the completely off-the-wall stuff that makes our lives that little but less hum-drum and predictable. You’ll have heard of The Sealed Knot who get together, dress up in period costume and re-enact historical events. Well, there’s a different lot of similarly minded folk who concentrate their spare time on being Vikings in the same sort of manner. Full Article
3. Windy Spring Special
A very choppy, gusty, squally Saturday morning meant that we had to cancel all water-born activities for this weekend (Sat 9th March). Cranfleet Cut was full of white horses, but not the sort that could carry you across to the Sailing Club. As it turned out we spent a very pleasant and mostly dryish morning chewing the fat whilst bolting two of our eights together after they’d returned from being repaired. Full Article
2. Nottingham Head of the Trent Race
I’m afraid this has missed the editor’s deadline so my report on our race in Nottingham is going to be old news by the time you read this. We had three boats racing in the Nottingham Head of the Trent race on Sun 24th Feb. Our men’s crews (with mostly men in them, there being one notable exception in our boat) were racing in Division 1, supposed to start at 10 o’ clock but got put back to 11:30 in the end because of the early morning fog making it hard to find the far bank. This left competing crews trying to psyche each other out in the car park for quite some time beforehand. There’s only so much of that you can do though, most people being of a fairly sociable nature. Full Article
1. An Introduction
I always had a big problem starting a piece of written work at school. I was usually alright once I’d got going, but heaving myself off the blocks was never my strong suit. Err . . Hmmm? . . . . I’d like to tell you a bit about our rowing club. . . Full Article
