Bainbridge Island Rowing Juniors and Masters rowers showed strong performances with numerous wins and places at the Covered Bridge Regatta on Dexter Lake near Eugene, Oregon April 22-23. This was the first major Spring regatta and featured several hundred rowers competing in over 40 events. The competition drew 28 rowing clubs from Oregon, Washington, and California, including many local clubs, who came to compete on the 2000 meter course.
Conditions were ideal for racing on Saturday morning with glassy, calm waters. But by early afternoon, strong cross-winds had developed, eventually building to headwinds of greater than 15 knots by 4 PM, which led to the postponing of multiple races to Sunday. The bad weather on Saturday caused the mixed Men’s and Women’s Masters 8+ event to be cancelled.
However, all Juniors races for both days were completed by early afternoon Sunday.
Bainbridge rowers out-stroked many teams, despite the challenging conditions, to win medals in multiple heats, The Bainbridge Men’s Masters won every event they entered, including the premier eight oared event in a field of eight crews. The Women’s Masters Four also placed third in their event. The Juniors also stroked to multiple wins, including the Women’s Varsity 8+, Women’s JV 8+, Women’s Novice 4+, and Men’s JV Pair and 4+, as well as seven second place and eight third place finishes.
Head Juniors Coach, Tim Goss, said, “We are quite pleased with the results from the weekend. Not only did our crews race well under challenging conditions, but race officials managed to run all of the junior races. BI Crews have been gathering speed throughout the season and this weekend posted strong performances. Bainbridge placed 5th out of 16 teams (61.3% efficiency), narrowly missing third by 1.4 % points. Vashon Island (62.6%) took third and North Bay RC took 4th (62.5%).”
Complete results are as follows:
First Place
- Men’s Junior Varsity 2 with a time of 7:40:90
- Men’s Junior Lightweight 4+ with a time of 7:52:94
- Women’s Junior Lightweight 8+ with a time of 7:52:89
- Women’s Junior Novice 4+ C with a time of 8:23:09
- Men’s Masters 1x with a raw time of 4:04.94
- Men’s Masters 4+ A with a raw time of 4:05.42
- Men’s Masters 4+ C with a raw time of 4:05.80
Second Place
- Men’s Junior Novice 4+ B with a time of 7:41:39
- Men’s Varsity 4+ B with a time of 7:49:93
- Women’s Junior Varsity 4+ with a time of 8:11:46
- Women’s Junior Lightweight 4+ with a time of 8:20:42
- Women’s Junior Novice 4+ with a time of 8:49:52
- Women’s Junior Novice 8+ with a time of 6:54:95
- Men’s Masters 4+ with a raw time of 4:24.39
- Men’s Masters 8+ with a raw time of 3:16.45
Third Place
- Men’s Junior Lightweight 8+ with a time of 7:05:81
- Men’s Junior JV 4+ C with a time of 8:23:28
- Men’s Junior Novice 8+ with a time of 6:57:31
- Men’s Junior Novice 4+ with a time of 7:50:14
- Men’s Junior Varsity 2 with a time of 8:38:86
- Women’s Junior Varsity 8 with a time of 7:41:76
- Women’s Junior Novice 4+ with a time of 8:33:07
- Women’s Masters 4+ with a time of 4:44:21
Next up for Bainbridge Island Rowing is the Brentwood Regatta, which takes place this weekend, April 28-30, on Vancouver Island, BC.