National Indoor Rowing Junior Championships

March 26th, 2010

On Tuesday 16th March indoor rowers from the North East, including three from Durham Johnston, travelled to London to take part in the National Junior Indoor Rowing Championships (NJIRC).

After the highly successful North East Regional Indoor Rowing Championships held in the first week of March at Maiden Castle, Durham, partners in that event - The Tony Blair Sports Foundation, Northumbrian Water and the Competition Managers were able to offer individual medalists the chance to enter the National Junior Indoor Rowing Championships (NJIRC) held at Battersea Evolution in London on Tuesday 18 March.

It was 11pm on Monday evening as the luxury coach, sponsored by Northumbrian Water, pulled away from Morpeth with the first group of North East rowers. Picking additional competitors, parents, coaches and staff at Hexham and Durham, they travelled south through the night. After a brief comfort break at Wetherby, quiet fell in the darkness of the coach as eyes closed and a few snatched hours of sleep were taken.

Crossing Chelsea Bridge and turning into Battersea Park at just after half past 6, the deserted car park greeted the bleary eyed group. There was life though, as some of the earliest event organizers took the competition registrations and soon the excitement began to grow as the interior of the huge building lit up with coloured lights, 80 rowing machines being tested, volunteers being briefed and various associated activities being set up. By nine the place was beginning to fill with well over 100 volunteers and just over 3000 competitors from right across the country.

Racing began at shortly before 10.30am and continued non stop throughout the day, heat after heat, with some really great results for the Durham Johnston rowers:

All three competitors achieved personal bests as they had improved in the distance rowed in every round:

Clare Harding, Senior Competition Manager for County Durham said: "This year is the first time ever we have had competitors in the National Finals. The rowers from Durham Johnston have clearly proved themselves on the national stage and are a reaI credit to the hard work undertaken in our schools. "