We had the last regatta of the year, and there was another clutch of medals for Banbury paddlers at the National Sprint Championships (and for those who now wear a different colour of vest!).
Jessie U got silver and bronze in U16 Girls k1, silver in the U18/16 K4 and bronze in a K2. Will McC was another multi-medallist with bronze in the U18 boys K4 and K2. Robin A took silver in the 054 1000 and bronze in the O54 K2 with Jerry H. Joe P (racing for RLSCC) won silver in an U23 K2, and Arthur U (for Royal) also won silver in the U23 K4.
There were some other, non-national-race places on the day, including a 2nd in the O34 Women’s K4 – where there was less than a second between the three boats on the line.
A highlight of the day was seeing Iain and Roger W – both ex-international paddlers, get back into boats, specifically for the inaugural Andy Boonham C4 memorial race. They clearly haven’t lost it, as their boat had a fairly comfortable win. Iain has now moved away from paddling, but Roger is one of those who disproves the theory that “you’ll never make money doing this” as he is now one of the coaches for the very successful GB paracanoe team, who have just qualified a number of boats for Tokyo next year, and topped the medal table at the recent World Championships.
Another managing to mix work and water time is Luke J, who was racing for the winning RAF team at the inter-services championships.
Sticking with sprint, the club made its annual trip to the Sobeka Flanders Cup. We take a junior team each year to give them some experience of international racing before they are selected to GB squads. A happy group came back clutching medals – and looking very tired.
The new Hasler season has started but, with quite a few at Sobeka, it was a small team at Pangbourne. Highlights were Chris and Simon P 3rd in Div 7 K2, and Joe E who was promoted to Div 6.
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