Marin Rowing sent 11 boats to the Head of the Charles Regatta in Boston, MA this weekend. The Charles is well known as the biggest Fall Head Race in the World. Crews from Countries all around the globe come to race at this prestigious event on the Charles River.
Overall, Marin Rowing was a dominant program and we finished fifth in the overall points standing. The order of points were:
1st - CRI
2nd - Harvard
3rd - Riverside
4th - Yale
5th - Marin
Marin took home one Gold (Grand-Masters Women's 8+, a first for the MRA), five Silver (Jr. W 8+, MW 40+ 8+, MM 60+ 8+, MM 60+ 4+, Penelope Starr Sr.Veteran 1x), two Bronze (MW 50+ 8+, MW 60+ 4+), one 4th (MM 40+ 8+) and 2 5th (MM Club 4+, MW M4+) place medals. Medals are given out to the top 5 crews in each event. The number of crews in each event varied from 5 to 68.
Here is some great analysis from the coaches and rowers:
2nd Place - Junior Women's 8+: cox Chelsea Lucas, 8-Michele Leason, Caitlin Morgan, Olivia Ley, Caroline Rosetti, Erica Rippe, Hailey Wunsch, Audrey Wooster, bow-Lela McCrea. Coming off of a 2008 National Championship win and returning 6 athletes from that 8+, the juniors traveled to Boston hoping for a win in this event for the first time in the history of the junior program. We started in 5th place out of 69 crews as a result of taking that slot at last year's regatta. The first place starting crew, the ever fast Community Rowing, Inc. out of Boston, was just 3 crews away from us and although we posted the fastest time of all crews to Riverside we had just enough traffic to take the edge off and fell behind the crew from CRI to take second by 6 seconds. We are proud of our placement but disappointed at the same time. Next year's crew will start 2nd and will have no one between them and CRI, but it will be a new 8+ and they will have to go fast!
Master Women's Eight 40+ - 2nd place. Beat Etas-Unis the defending two-time champion in this race made up of former National Team athletes. The winner was Minneapolis Rowing Club. Marin was just 3 seconds behind the winner.
Cox- Rod Warner
stroke- Meredith May
Cassandra Cunningham
Liz Thoron
Sarah Pelmas
Cristina Battani
Kate Boyd
Ann Cummings
Tanya Chitnis
Senior Masters Eight 50+ - 3rd Place. Beat last year's 2nd Place Saugatuck Crew from Connecticut and gained 10 seconds on 1980 Club. 2nd place was taken by Martha's Mom's but we were pleased with our increased speed from 2007 and will be working on getting the next 10 seconds to win.
Cox: Mary Boland
Stroke- Cate Wallenfels
Katherine MacKenzie Grimes
Cheryl Brink
Dara Altobelli-Turchi
Laura Short
Brigitte Merrell
Terry McGaw
Alison Carbone
Grand-Masters Eight 60+ - Came back this year after losing to Avalon Rowing Club by 20 seconds in 2007 and won the event by 25 seconds for the first Gold Medal win at the Head of the Charles by the Marin Masters Women.
Cox: Alysha Koorji
stroke- Stacey Ford
Lindy Edward
Liz Hart
Marta Osterloh
Barbara Berling
Corrie Sias
Beth Travers
Judy Kimmel
Marin's Masters Men: Three out of our four entries were guaranteed entries, meaning that our race times from last year qualified us to row in these events automatically this
year. Our guaranteed entries for this year are in the following events:
Men's Senior-Masters Fours, Grand-master category (60+ years old) - 2nd Place in 2008
Men's Senior-Masters Eights, Grand-master category (60+ years old) 2nd in 2008
Men's Masters Eight (40+ years old) - 4th place in 2008.
The Masters events require that all rowers in the boats be 30 years or older. As such, we entered a boat in the Men's Club Fours this year to accommodate a few of our fastest younger rowers and were awarded the entry.
We put together some extremely fast boats, at least one of which we believe could win gold at the Head of the Charles, a goal that has eluded the Masters Men's team. The Senior-Masters Fours with rowers Alex Filatov, Andy Kerr, Joel Kimmel, Dick Draeger and coxed by Jay Rhodes is a very fast four, which raced at the Head of the Port in Sacramento winning the event by three full minutes. The boat is very fast for their age group and we are hopeful that they can win the event this year, despite intense competition. They started in seventh position (out of 26 crews, starting position is indicative of finish position the previous year) behind Naragansett Boat Club (from Providence, RI) and in front of Occoquan International, a boat usually made up of ex-national team members. The crew took the Silver behind Occoquan International on Saturday. The boat finished 11th out of 26 (42%) in the 50+ category and 2nd out of 3 (66%) out of the 60+ boats with a time of 19:24.493. They had a very fierce Occoquan boat chasing after them and were bested by them with a time of 18:59.552. The third boat in the category was from Community Rowing and they finished 22nd with a time of 20:53.190. So, very nice job by the 60+ 4+. Sadly, that win at the Charles continues to elude us! Next year!
The Masters-Eights entry started from third position this year, behind Kent Mitchell Rowing Club (Redwood Shores, CA), and in front of Potomac Rowing Club (Washington, DC) with rowers Ken Clemmer, Greg Rinehart, Bob Wagner, Noah Wickliffe, Michael McGinn, Michael Breard, Tom Lee, Ari Berman and coxswain Adrian Andrews. We believed this boat has a good chance of medaling as well, which they did. The crew took a very solid 4th place behind winner Kent Mitchell, 2nd place Penn AC and German crew RV Rijnland. This is an incredibly impressive result for our men. The crew finished 4th out of 31 boats (12.9%) with a time of 15:37.945 beating out Potomac (15:41.614), The Old Lights (15:52.994), and Trident (15:59.217), but being bested by RV Rijnland (15:33.988), Pennsylvania Athletic Club (15:25.523), and this year's winners, Kent Mitchell (15:20.438). The good news is that, by the subordinate medals rules (see below), the 40+ 8+ received a 4th place medal at the Head of the Charles this year!! So, again, congratulations guys!! It was a fantastic row!!
Our Senior-Masters Eight(50+)started in 13th position behind Brigantine Rowing Club and in front of Huntington Barge and Paddle Club with rowers Brian Kelly, JJ Thorp, Stephen Johnson, Tim Jenvey, Todd Boley, Victor Aron, John Proctor, Jack Dupen and coxswain Colin McGaw. This crew brought home another 2nd place medal for the men in the Grand-Master (60+) event.Senior-Master eights - Grandmaster category (60+ 8+, Colin): Finished 20th out of 41 (48%) in the 50+ category and 3rd out of 8 (37.5%) out of the 60+ boats with a time of 18:11.586. They beat out Royal Boatclub de Maas (18:18.859), Alte Achter Boat Club (18:31.310), Cambridge Boat Club (18:51.270), and London Rowing Club (19:26.455) but were bested by Pocock (17:55.390) and Occoquan (17:16.453). So, a very nice job done by that eight, and congrats on beating some very solid teams.
Finally, our Club four entry started in 23rd position with rowers Tyler Lange, Hanns Hartman, Mark Tepper, Dan Felling and coxswain Sam Deutsch. Since this boat was a lottery entry, their starting position was randomly chosen. The club 4+ passed 17 crews to take 5th place, earn a medal and a guaranteed entry for 2009. The crew finished 5th out of 43 boats (11.6%) with a time of 17:32.107 narrowly beating out Boston University Men's Crew (17:32.963), Occoquan (17:33.721) and Texas Crew (17:35.198)but were bested by Wilmington Rowing Center (17:31.255), University of Pittsburgh (17:27.760), Big Foot Moving Boat Club (17:13.966) and Riverside Boat Club, this year's winners with a time of 16:53.500. By the rules of subordinate medals (see below), the club four received a 5th place medal at the Head of the Charles this year!! Congratulations guys, well done!!!
The Masters Men team has been very fortunate to attract a large amount of talent to row with us and has received excellent coaching over the years. This combination has allowed our team to be internationally competitive and to earn the respect of the fastest teams in the country. We are proud to continue the legacy of the Marin Masters Men.
http://www.marinrowing.org/article.php?story=20081020122807734