Trinity claims head of the river at Champion’s Lake

[Burgs]

Trinity claims head of the river at Champion’s Lake

28th March 2009, 13:45 WST

Trinity College has claimed school boy rowing’s biggest prize – the annual head of the river regatta at Champion’s Lake in Armadale.

Today’s first staging of the event at the new venue, was a thriller with Trinity showing their superiority to win in a record time of five minutes 50seconds surpassing the previous best of 5:57sec at the former Canning Bridge course.

Trinity, Scotch College and Christ Church Grammar School went through the first 500m together with Scotch and Trinity eventually switching their leads all the way through to the 1000m mark.

Trinity maintained the pressure to win by a boat length with Scotch finishing second followed by Christ Church, Hale, Guildford, Wesley and Aquinas.

It was Trinity’s third win since 2004 with Christ Church winning the other three regattas during the period.

The Hamer Cup, for the best performed school, was won by Scotch with 264 points followed by Trinity (259), Christ Church (225), Aquinas (207), Guildford (205) and Hale and Wesley on 189.

PERTH
GENE STEPHAN

I suddenly feel pretty old, it will now definately be twenty years since our last win when my Yr11 Scotch 1st VIII have our twenty year reunion next March

Congratulations to Trinity and commiserations to the Scotchie boys, you learn over time there really is no second place at the Head of the River

[jargan83]

I'm sure it excited the silver spoon brigade
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[brokendown gunfighter]

dont forget the pimms jargan

[Darren]

big ups for the Jnr Toffs, now get outa the water and back to the rah rah...

[Thequeerone]

You can scoff - but I well remember young gentlemen in other years working their socks off for this.

Kudos to those that did and HTFU to those who think that it's that easy.

PS I still reckon their parents should have used the money saved to buy these people a house but the sins of the father should not be felt by the children.

[Cowboy]

For anyone who has never rowed a 5:50 min in an 8, I can assure you it is not an easy achievement, I am guessing that you have also never finished an ergo and not been able to stand though either. Rugby also has a reputation for being full of private school prats, but I don't hold that against it.

Well done to Trinity.
Never realised that you also once rowed Burgs.

[brokendown gunfighter]

you miss the point,its not the students we are having a crack at,just the line up of toorak tractors along the course!

[Cowboy]

Sorry, I did miss the point.

It is an unusual sport though, the Head of the River draws more attention than the Kings Cup. Has to be the only sport where school boy level has the greatest following/prestige.

[lmaag]

let's not forget the south west head of the river next sunday! small but growing every year, rowing and rugby in the SW, how lucky are these kids?

[jargan83]

Has to be the only sport where school boy level has the greatest following/prestige.

Olympic?
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[Cowboy]

My impression is that apart from a certain Miss Robins most people in WA would struggle to recognise any olympic rowers from WA.
But the flottila of pleasure cruisers that flock to watch Head of the River, now that is impressive.

[jargan83]

probably because a large proportion of the population don't really care about either
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[Burgs]

Think he means at the participation at the state level Jargs.
There are several Rowing Clubs for Seniors but you don't hear much of them but normally there is something mentioned about the HotR around the traps, in the news etc.

A wonderful use of stereotypes too by the way.
I can assure you there are far more students at those schools, at least in WA, whose parents bust their arses to get them there than there are "silver spoon bridgade".

[Cowboy]

probably because a large proportion of the population don't really care about either
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That is true and alot of people never get the chance or take the opportunity to give rowing a try. And it is boring to watch.

But for the people who do give rowing a try they soon learn just how difficult and demanding a sport it is. I believe there are very good reasons why rowing and rugby are considered "elitist" sports, they were the original extreme sports. It's not that private schools adopted them to be superior to everyone else, they just realised how much participation in these demanding sports benefited their students. Much the same as both the United States officer training and the Chinese Army have made rugby mandatory sports as a part of their programmes, they realised there are benefits to participation off the field.

---------- Post added at 21:54 ---------- Previous post was at 21:48 ----------

Think he means at the participation at the state level Jargs.
There are several Rowing Clubs for Seniors but you don't hear much of them but normally there is something mentioned about the HotR around the traps, in the news etc.

A wonderful use of stereotypes too by the way.
I can assure you there are far more students at those schools, at least in WA, whose parents bust their arses to get them there than there are "silver spoon bridgade".

-So your a rower Cowboy?
:Yes, I'm training with the Kings Cup crew at the moment.
-Will you get to race in THE HEAD OF THE RIVER?
:No, I'm out of school now. We would be racing at the national championships.
-Oh, pity.

I think I'm just jealous

[Ecky]

1) Nor surprising it's a new record given it's now held at a stillwater rowing facility.

2) Pretty sure it's Champion Lakes, not Champion's Lake.

3) Also pretty sure the Toorak Tractors would have to be parked in the car parks - not allowed aside the water.

4) Well done you Micks.