An important factor in Ireland’s successful Olympic rowing campaign was the break from the tyranny of the unpredictable Irish weather by the siting of serious blocks of training at overseas venues in the winter months.
The December/January camp this season will be located in Seville and should be the biggest ever overseas camp for top Irish rowers in terms of numbers, as UCD, Queen’s and NUIG will also train at the Spanish venue.
The winter winds have just claimed their first event. The Neptune Head of the River, set for Saturday, November 5th, at Blessington Lakes, has been cancelled. The detailed Met Éireann forecast predicted average winds above 20km/h and gusts up to 55km.
There will be no refixture.
Last year the “head” was cancelled and slotted into the January timetable. It ran into more weather difficulties and was cancelled on the day.
“We didn’t win any friends with that,” said Jimmy O’Neill of Neptune. “We decided in advance that this time we would not look at another date in the calendar if we had to cancel.”
Remarkably, after the extraordinarily dry October, the water level is lower on Blessington Lakes than it was in the summer, when the Metropolitan Regatta had to be cancelled.
An Ireland women's group trained at Blessington last weekend and a men's and women's group at the National Rowing Centre in Cork. They had good conditions.
Coaching jobs
Off the water, the interview panel has forwarded the names and rankings of the candidates for Ireland coaching jobs to the board of Rowing Ireland. An announcement should be made in the next few weeks. The board meets on November 20th.
The lack of certainty in Rowing Ireland funding for the year ahead – a recurring problem – means it is unlikely that a second coaching appointment will be made for some time.
Queen’s have entered an elite quadruple – Sam McKeown, Philip Doyle, Tiernan Oliver and Chris Beck – and an elite lightweight quad for the Fours Head in London on November 12th. Former Ireland junior Holly Nixon is in the top women’s boat, the Leander elite quadruple. Nixon excelled at the British Championships in the women’s quadruple.
There was also a strong Irish flavour to the winning Open lightweight four: Niall Kenny and Lloyd Seaman teamed up with Kieran Brown and Nathan O’Reilly to win for Tideway Scullers.
Interestingly, for Irish planning purposes, the event was run in October, the month championed by some in the high-performance programme for the Irish Championships.
The British also compete on age grounds, so under-23 and under-19 events are offered alongside the senior ones. This would be a good template for a slimmed-down Irish Championships.
The first British assessment is on this weekend, November 5th and 6th, with Coleraine man Joel Cassells looking to make an impression.
