Report on Hollingworth Lake rowers success at the National Championships.

Medal winners at the National Great Britain Rowing Championships.

Hollingworth Lake rowers picked up 2 Gold, 1 Silver and 3 Bronze medals at the National Championships held at the National Watersports Centre in Nottingham last weekend. On Friday 13years old junior Jess Leyden won the semi-final of the Womens Junior 14 single sculls event by a massive 20 seconds to progress straight to the final on Saturday. In the final she extended her lead to 28sec to take the Gold medal in magnificent style leaving the opposition in her wake. Well done Jess, who now looks set for a golden future in rowing.

Jess Leydan

Next up was the Women’s Junior double scull in which Rachel Flanders was teamed up with an Agecroft athlete. Rachel at 17 had been the youngest person to row the Atlantic in 2007. This was a very different race, in the semi-final they kept close to the leaders Nottingham finishing second by 2 seconds yet feeling comfortable. The final on the Sunday was more difficult, Notingham and Henley both got off to a fast start and led by a couple of lengths by the 500 metre mark Rachel and Olivia held on through the middle 1000 and put in a huge effort over the last 500 but were unable to make up the deficit but claiming the bronze medal. A valiant effort considering they had only been training together for 2 weeks.

Stuart Sykes

Stuart Sykes was competing in the Men’s junior single sculls and the men’s junior double with an athlete from Evesham. In the singles Stuart won his heat to go straight to the final by some 7 seconds, the final was a close race and he battled very hard with a sculler from Leicester who just took the gold by a small margin Stuart taking the silver medal. In the Double sculls Stuart and his partner were dominant right through the three races winning by margins of 12secs, 6secs and the final by 4secs to take the Gold medal in fine style. As a consequence of these wins Stuart has been selected to represent England in the Home Internationals as the junior single and double sculler against Scotland Wales and Ireland. This event will be held at Nottingham on Saturday the 26th July.

Also competing was junior 16 sculler Andy Jepson who won through the time trials, won his semi-final and came 5th in the final. Lucy Walczak rowing as Molesey won a bronze medal in open womens single sculls and came 4th in the Under 23 womens sculls. Craig Morgan rowing in an Agecroft eight also won a bronze medal.

All in a very encouraging performance from a little Club based on a Lake nestled in the Pennines.