Queen’s’ very own top rowing athletes dominated at the season’s kickoff event.
The season kicked off by travelling down to Peterborough for an Oct. 3-4 event, named The Head of Trent Regatta. Hosted by the Peterborough Rowing club, it’s an annual event starting back in 1971. The event has been attended by the Gaels for more than 15 years. As far as the results go, the Gaels collected 21 total medals including five gold, eight silver, and eight bronze.
The Journal sat down with Queen’s Rowing Head Coach Scott Feddery to talk about all things rowing here at Queen’s.
He explained that the rowing team is unique in the fact that their selections take two or three weeks because of the way rowing crews are set up. They select on several different factors including size and weight of boat, as well as rankings and experience levels.
“We are subject to conditions, if we get a really windy day, we can’t do selection the way we want,” Feddery said. “It’s been such an unsettled fall this year, that’s helped extend our selection time frame.”
Feddery admitted that before this regatta, many of his crews had just got settled and tried to get accustomed into what he calls “the bigger boats,” crews of fours and eights.
The Head of Trent Regatta is a head race, meaning that boats start in intervals and are timed accordingly. An aspect of the race flows through the Trent canal along Trent University and people can watch at a close distance.
“The canal is usually packed with people, which is quite exciting when you get a bunch of crews right on top of each other through there,” Feddery said. “Rowing doesn’t have a lot of those exciting moments because it’s usually so far away.”
Feddery believes they have a really deep team and is not shocked with the number of medals they have earned.
“We were really successful in our small boats, singles and doubles and pairs,” Feddery said. “That’s something we’re more familiar with.”
The competition seems to have gotten stronger in the OUA, as Feddery saw some “interesting results where we can see our hands full.” Feddery, focusing on his team, knows that their top end speed is “really good, so just a matter of spending a little more time in our big boat.”
The men’s personal performances that stood out at the regatta was the captain Nigel Radakrishnan, Sci ’27, who won the open single as a lightweight, which Feddery expressed was “a pretty crazy achievement to do.”
READ MORE: Queen’s Rowing on a roll as season approaches
On the women’s side, women’s captain Kaija Erickson, Kin ’27, and Jacquie Groenewegan, Sci ’27, won the women’s pair event in “really dominant fashion.” Gillian Jansen, ArtSci ’27, took home a solo win, triumphing in the lightweight women’s single.
Heading into the next event at Brock University, it is a two-kilometre sprint distance which Feddery said, “tends to be a really good gauge of where we are as a team overall.”
The team will look to build off their success as they look to be in peak season form when the OUA championships come on Oct. 31.
Tags
Kingston Rowing Club, men's rowing, Rowing
All final editorial decisions are made by the Editor(s) in Chief and/or the Managing Editor. Authors should not be contacted, targeted, or harassed under any circumstances. If you have any grievances with this article, please direct your comments to eic@queensjournal.ca.