BDA LRC 2009

Final BDA round comes to London Regatta Centre!

The season finale… home waters.

What started on a cold, grey day in Liverpool was ending on a warm sunny day in London. In between we managed to cram in Exeter, Bristol, Stockton (although I wasn’t present), Chinatown Lions at LRC, Preston, Worcester and Bewl Water. And I also managed to tag along with Typhoons to race in Hong Kong!

We entered the day with two crews… we had a mix of young and old, experienced and inexperienced. But we worked as a team (well two teams), and produced some amazing races with excellent results.

Raging Bulls did very well and should be proud of their achievements as many of the crew were competing for the first time! And a lot were only racing for the 3rd or 4th time!

So onto the Raging Dragons... We put together the strongest team possible for the day and we were looking to blow the other teams away. However, we encountered a couple of set backs in the form of injuries and sickness. Undeterred we had races to win and bragging rights to fight for!

200m

The first race of the day… and in typical Rage fashion we were late! Ha… home waters, we knew what time our race was and we still couldn’t get to the start line on time. Verbal warning was given and verbal abuse from Eddy followed! Anyway… we put this behind us and focused on the race. First race of the day on our own waters… we HAD to lay down our intentions and we did. From the start we propelled our boat forward and surged to a half boat lead before reaching out and pulling away for a fantastic finish in 47s and winning the heat in a convincing manner. This was to be the second fastest time in the heats and we knew we had the potential for scoring some big points.

The second race was the 200m Semi Final… This was always going to be tough. Kingston Royals (consistently one of the best teams throughout the season) was next to us and we knew that it would be between to the two of us to qualify outright for the Major Cup Final. As soon as the starter shouted go we went for it… And in another typical Rage style, the dragon head came off and disrupted the left side of the boat and we lost a couple of metres on Kingston… We fought back and pulled level, but ultimately we lost by a dragon head.

It was a tough race but we showed character and strength that we did not have at the beginning of the season. Our time was a bit slower than the heats, but we still posted the fastest runner up time and were in the 200m Major Cup Final.

The final was between Batchworth, Kingston, Thames and us. We were racing to win and for bragging rights over our LRC counterparts!

Looking at the times posted by the 4 finalists, this was going to be a close race. There was a second difference between the fastest finalist and the slowest. This was going to be won and lost on the start line.

All four boats must have leapt off the line and there was no drama, no deviations from lanes, no losing of dragon heads… nothing but 88 people heading for the finish line as quickly as they can. It took 3 boats under 47s and the fourth just over 47s.

The final placings… Kingston, Batchworth, Rage followed by Thames. This was one of the best races we had all season and we showed that on our day we can mix with the best in the country. We may not have as many GB members in our squad (Richie being the only member) compared to other teams, and we probably lose out on race experience too with nearly half the crew having only joined this season (some mid-season). But what we had was heart and team work. Up next… 500m!

500m

Buoyed by our success in the 200m we were ready to go one better in the 500m races. And in a repeat performance of the 200m we blitzed the other 3 teams and we only had the clock to beat. The team fought for every metre and finished strongly with a time of 2m 6s.

A great time considering the lack of competition to drive us and only 2s off the fastest Rage time over 500m. But we are in the elite and that was not the fastest… Nonetheless we were into the Semi Finals again and we had a long break for the other crews to finish the reps and finalise placings.

The Semi Final was against Kingston again. We wanted revenge!

The difference between winning and losing is quite small as we saw in the 200m final. And the difference this time was the start. Kingston had a jump on us from the start line and we did not have the power or stamina to claw the deficit back. We crossed the line 0.5s behind and qualified as the fastest runner up for the 500m Final.

Whilst we were waiting to finish the seasons last race the Raging Bulls had a final of their own to win. This was against Typhoon Fury and Typhoon Scratch. And as we all know there is a long standing rivalry (friendly of course) between the two clubs. No matter which team was racing, we always want to win. Obviously the Typhoon Scratch were not going to be as fast as Typhoon Fury, but the fact they managed to get both teams into the final was impressive form!

Although it was difficult to judge how the teams were doing until around the 200m mark, it was clear that Fury and Bulls were the two frontrunners in the race, but it was close. Once the teams came within sight the Bulls were clear in front! But Fury fought back and closed the gap on the final 100m… there was a moment of doubt, but Bulls managed to dig deep and held on to cross the line and win their final!

And there was to be another success for the Sun Lik Red Lotus and Pershore borrowed it for their final and also came in first for their race!

It was our turn. The final race of the final event and we were in it. This is it… our last chance to put ourselves on the map and make sure everyone realizes that they will need to keep an eye on us for next season.

The race start was clean… the transition was good and the rate was steady. There was power, aggression and control. We raced our heart out but it was not to be the glory ending we all hoped for and fought for. The other three teams, Kingston, Batchworth and Thames were just a bit stronger and just a bit faster.

We did not hang our heads in shame, we performed to the best of our ability and we ARE one of the best teams in the country.

The season has now ended and intensity will reduce. But we have set the standard and we have to live up to it now.

Nationals in Nottingham next week… lets repeat our performance and finish with some silverware!