Chris Perkins took a wander up to London on Saturday to have a look at the Great River Race, and catch a few snaps of the action.
Saturday’s GRR was superb, bright sun, warm, light breeze – all pretty perfect for the race. I got to the start at Millwall about 30 min before the gun and found organised chaos but all very entertaining. The Skiffs were already on the water milling around. No sign of Coigach – I think they headed down to Southend for a bit of a warm up but the NB boats were in the throng. Lots of bright finished Mahogany so heaven for me. If I had got there in time I had hoped to pass over the video to a Skiffie passenger to capture some footage from the water but no matter – I did manage a few sequences in between relentless snapping with the Nikon.
I got confused by the start, I though the idea was that boats were given a start time based on measurement so didn’t really understand why Porty started earlier than NB & Coigach….
I found it amazing just how quickly the boats ran the course – I left Millwall about 10 min after the Skiffs and apart from a quick looksee at Embankment was on the Underground to Richmond with good links and saw the first boat under Richmond Bridge about 20 min after I arrived – impressive! I know it was a strong tide but even so very good going.
The Start at Millwall
With a Thames barge. For those with an interest, in their heyday the Thames barges were worked by a man and a boy – that’s it – two crewmen.
Icebreaker
Coigach Lass at Richmond Bridge
Skiff John B at Richmond
and the ladies in St Baldred
There are many, many more pics of the GRR by Chris on Flickr at http://www.flickr.com/photos/10180659@N02/sets/72157631544252519/ . There is also a skiffy selection on the scottish rowing group.
Full results are now available. It looks like St Baldred might have been fastest Ladies 60+, but there was only a prize for overall 60+ . Also we notice that Wormit rowing Club were there with a Tay Gig.
Coigach’s own report on their silver medal performance can be found on their website.
