It is that time of the year when rowing starts to heat up and regattas are the go.
If you were around Lake Nagambie on February 19 and 20, you may have noticed the extra activity.
Let’s do the stats: 184 races over the two days, 100 on the Saturday and 84 on the Sunday; 1371 athletes filled 2401 seats, for 706 entries.
Saturday was our school and aged events — under-19s, under-21s and under-23s.
The selectors were also out and about putting together our next Vic state crews. If you go through the results, you won’t see a lot from the Nagambie rowers — not because we ‘can’t’ row, but because we didn’t.
It was all hands on deck, with lots of tasks before during and after the regatta. This was the club’s major fundraiser for the year and everyone pitched in to tackle the many jobs on hand — boat holding at the 2000-metre start, umpire boat driving, race timing, kitchen duties, canteen serving, manning the barbecue, commentating and medal presentations, to name most of them.
The club also gets a small fee from the race entries, so combined with canteen and barbecue takings, some new equipment may be on the horizon.
Regattas are very important to all clubs for this reason. The COVID-19 carnage of cancelled events took its toll on all sports and fundraisers. Here’s hoping that’s all behind us.
The exception to Nagambie rowers rowing were a couple of our juniors on the Sunday, who earned their spots on the water by doing the chores before and after their events.
The female under-17 single scull saw Clodagh McCarthy and Ava Cafasso at the pointy end of their heats, then place fourth and third respectively in the final. It was a tough gig as both were punching well above their age group.
The mixed double scull was an open event which saw Imogen Cafasso and Ben Shelton team up to win their heat and come a close second in the final. Again, both are just 17 years old and were pushing against open class rowers.
Shelton backed up again to win both his heat and final in the male B-grade single scull, a great effort in the open company.
McCarthy also showed her class in the female C-grade single scull, winning both her heat and final.
Finally, a former Nagambie junior and youth rower, who represented well over many years and now wears the LaTrobe Uni colours, won the female B-grade single scull. We will still claim Julia Finnegan as a Nagambie rower.
So, congrats to those young Nagambie rowers who performed admirably. Special mentions to Neil Lodding, who went out in all weather to coach Finnegan. Lodding is a 1964 Olympian, local legend and great supporter of rowing.
Club captain Sue Andrews effectively co-ordinated the regatta as regatta secretary. She had many willing helpers and Deb Dudley cracked the whip in the kitchen. Thank you also to club president Henry Moss, Neville Howell and Beth Walter for presenting medals both days.
The Girls Junior Vic State Championships were held on Saturday February 26, on the Barwon River at Geelong. McCarthy rose again to take out the Year 9 single sculls, winning her heat by a good margin. This allowed her to row in the top A final of the event, where she came from behind early and rowed through the field for a comfortable win.
McCarthy was representing her school, Firbank.