The Calm Before the Storm

Dear friends, family, members, and alumni of prep crew,

Yesterday marks our ninth day in England. As routine begins to set in, we reach our final day of practice, and see how different the days to come will be. The town of Henley has begun to fill as spectators and competitors alike arrive for the weeks events.

We practiced with Williams College again. After a warm-up to the lock down river, we entered the chutes with Williams for a starting sequence to the end of Temple Island followed by a 40-second piece at base rate at Fawley and ending with a closing 40 second piece at the end of the course. Williams won the first piece by about three seats, but met our strong 34 stroke-per-minute base during the second piece, losing by a seat. However, we were most proud of our third piece of the day. Williams started the shot a few strokes sooner than we had anticipated. We acheived our base speed half of a length down to Williams, but used our sprinting skills to finish the piece up one boatlength. It was a result we were all content with, and we were eager to put our honed speed into competition against Cheltenham College.

After practice, we wandered down the toe path to just above the finish line to watch the Spare Pairs race. The two coaches were seeded in their bracket, and were given a buy in the first round. Their first race held promise, holding a healthy four lengths ahead of their competition, but ended in misfortune as Coach Fife's oar connected with the dreaded white wooden poles that line the racecourse with about ten strokes to go. The pair lost the race by a small margin, but were happy with their performance otherwise.

The rest of the day consisted of a viewing of Atonement, some croquet, some shut-eye, and a tasty dinner before an early bedtime.

The day that some of us have dreamed of for the past four years has finally come. Our first day of racing at the prestigious Henley Royal Regatta was at hand. We were woken up early so that we would be fully awake by the time we reached the racecourse. I must say that waiting to start the course was nerve wrecking, but after a few songs on the iPod, it was time to depart for the race. We stayed in routine by jogging to the racegrounds, and got a long stretch in as we inspected the Bill Lamb Sr., which had been washed for the occasion.

We shoved off on schedule, and took down the course in our everyday warmup procedure; buisness as usual except we wore our new unisuits sporting the Jesuit logo above the quote "For My Brothers". We lined up next the Cheltenham College crew from whom we didn't know what to expect. By the time we completed our high-20 starting sequence, we had gained a length on the other boys in black and red. by the time we reached the Barrier, we had shifted down to 30 strokes-per-minute, and reached 26 strokes-per-minute by Fawley, where we stayed for the remainder of the race. The official announced that we had won our race "easily" with an estimated lead of about 8 boatlengths.

We met with our friends and family in front of the boat tents afterwards, and watched a few more races at the regatta enclosure before returning to the Coleman's house.

Thanks for the continued support!

Love,
The Prep Varsity 8