On Saturday 1st October 2016, 19 boats from Hampton School Boat Club took part in Reading’s Small Boats Head. This fantastic event took place at Reading Rowing Club from the morning till early evening. The day kicked-off with a 06:00 meet at the Hampton Boathouse. The boats were already on their trailers and the rowers eagerly got on the minibuses to have an extra 30 minutes’ sleep.
Despite the cold bite of a Saturday morning in October, the crews got their boats rigged and ready in no time. There was silence between the different schools, but the fight for the fastest time was in the air. The grass was saturated with water and the boys squeezed into the minibuses for shelter. The megaphone started to read out the crews taking part in Division 1. Each boat rowed up to the queue for the start line and they were unlucky to get there in time for the heavy rain. After around one hour of waiting drenched, our crews started their time trials. Throughout the piece, the scullers pushed themselves to the limit and ignored the fact that they were soaked from head to toe. However, one of our quads: Roger Wilko, came 25th out of 143 other crews, which shows that rain cannot dampen the determination of our rowers.
After a series of other successful pieces, the entire squad (including the coaches!) earned a rewarding lunch break whilst Division 2 took place. The boys could enjoy their lunches dry and warm in the comfort of the minibuses while not having to worry about the rain for a few hours.
As Division 3 began, the clouds parted and the sun shone down on the river. The crews set off to boat hoping there would be no more rain, which did last around 30 minutes, but the Great British weather continued to disappoint us. A light drizzle turned into painful hail storm, which then became a perpetual rainfall. There was also some water flowing out of a grate into the river at the start, which gave our singles and doubles a slight struggle, but they managed to recover well. Again, the rain could not stop our rowers from giving it their all. This resulted in one of the Hampton quads coming 34th place out of 136 other boats, which were mixed age groups ranging from J15s to J18s.
On the whole, Reading Small Boats Head proved to be a success for the Hampton School Boat Club J15s. 5 of our 8 crews coming in the top 50% of Division 1 and 2 of our 10 crews rowing in Division 3 came in the top 40%. The results for Division 3 were not as great as how we performed in Division 1, but our rowers did put in all their effort even after getting drenched in both Divisions. I am sure that they were all happy to go home after a rewarding day to have a warm, well-deserved shower and to relax on the sofa and watch some TV!
Armaan Mittal
Hampton School
