Thanks to the French Fishermen's blockade of the ports the trailer arrived late and Lloydy was forced to occupy the trailer spot furthest from the boating rafts but closest to the beer tents. This ominous pointer to Quintin's Munich form was quickly dispelled as we realised we had handed the muppetry mantle to Thames Tradesmen who had turned up with 6 blokes for a Veteran A VIII.

The travel delays meant that the training day was used by the Sons four to practice on the course and for Lofty, Richard and the Bucket to rig a load of boats. The Mortlake Lightweight girls met their saltired counterparts from St Andrews and got out in their quad. The course showed us its better side bathed in warm sunshine.

In the evening Roy Davies took over restaurant selection and was swayed by the fairy lights and empty tables of a restaurant near the hotel in Antwerp. Plenty of beer followed and eventually some very succulent steaks arrived. Later in the evening Russell phoned through to say he was on his way so the boys had of course to wait up for his arrival and have a few more beers with him once he got there.

Friday morning and two hung-over coxless fours raced in B coxless fours - the Sons boys shading Quintin by a second in different heats with both crews coming third. Nina and Kate had a nasty draw in Women's Vet A Doubles with Anna Lies Bredael, the Olympic Heavyweight Sculling Champion from the Barcelona Games, in the TRT Hazewinkel crew.

In E singles Big Frank had his showdown against Ken Williams from Horseferry and was dropped off the start. Ken had a great tussle down the course with an old rival, Jost Schreeb, a German sculler from RV Ingelheim.

Quintin's C Four had looked the strongest Quintin crew on paper with Kenny, Willy, Richard Lonnergan and "Diamond" Davies and they had a cracking row in C coxed coming a close second to an American crew from Occoquan. Their time was quicker than any of the winners in the other heats.

The afternoon saw the B VIIIs which was the race that a lot of the squad had really come for. Drawn in lane 6 Quintin went off at 46 the crew and settled to its race pace of 37 by 40 seconds. At the half way mark a planned lift saw Quintin push through the two German composites on our right. Over in Lane 1 and out of vision of the Quintin stern Dinamo Moscow had moved away and were almost a length clear of the field at this point. This information has been provided by Richard the Lighthouse Lonnergan but had been confirmed by Duncan who received a fax of the positions at this point. At 750m the plan was to attack in three sets of 10 strokes. The huge crew from Olympischer Rostock were closing in quickly when Kenny Almand bellowed "Who wants it?" to add to Lofty's commands. The battle with the German crews had in fact moved us back into contention with Moscow. Crossing the line at 41 we discovered that Dinamo Moscow, out in Lane 1 had in fact edged us by just under a quarter of a length. Subsequently Dinamo Moscow have had all of their crews disqualified for cheating and Quintin have the gold medals.Regardless of the medals the race itself was the highlight of this squad's season.

In the D fours Lloydy surpassed himself. With no dog leg to win it on he confounded the umpires by boating from the back of the beer tent, rowing past the winners' rostrum to proceed to the course. Stupidly a marshall asked him a question rather than ordering him back. There was no possible response for the umpire who wanted to know where Graham had come from. "England" was the moustachio's reply, though some people on the bank thought Wales was closer.

Willy Almand had a storming win the D singles beating a Peruvian, a Brazilian, a Dane, an Italian, a Frenchman and two Germans. Interviewed on the raft Willy tried to explain his win was due his Tideway worn macon sculls and to some interesting design modifications on his boat. The Rudergesellschaft boatbuilders from Pottsdam are currently contacting Halfords about their lightweight shopping bags in an effort to improve on decking materials.

The evening meal saw a remarkable turnaround in Belgium service. Roy was dropped from the role of restaurant chooser and an Argentinian gaucho restaurant was selected. More meat than was ever necessary was produced and Duncan came close to saying he was full.

Saturday morning saw A coxless fours at an obscene time. Even earlier - it was dark when they were boating - Nina and Kate came second in A quads with the St Andrews girls in a fast time. Giving away a load of years Dave Millbourn and Big Frank had a good scull in C doubles beating the Danes, the other Brits and a German crew.

Flushed with confidence from the BVIIIs Quintin were confident going into the C VIIIs. Losing John Ferraro and "Doughnut" we gained Willy and Big Frank. The pre-race talk from Willy left us in no doubt as to what to do. The 6 of us had to row exactly the way we had the day before whilst the two new boys sat in the bows and waved their birth certificates. In the event that was all we needed to do. Being a little bit excited at being up by three quarters of a length on our closest challengers at 500m the rate was a little over the required 37. Russell whimpered something about the rate and the extra strides we were supposed to do to bring the rate down but was over-ruled by Lofty. "Stuff the stride. I want clear water". He got it and the crew than proceeded to the winners' raft to get their medals. Getting to the raft as winners brought Quintin back to its usual levels of incompetency and muppetry. Jim got angry with the back seat drivers and the Captain pointed out to everyone that as they had just become world champions, would they kindly not row like c***s (borrowing his terms from the Almand Book of Phraseology).

Quintin surpassed themselves on the raft. Roy thanked the Belgians for their legendary customer service. The Lighthouse said how nice it was to beat the Germans again. Willy resumed his role as media personality when we were asked for the most famous rower in the boat. He explained that he wanted to win so that he could chat to the interviewer again. It was pointed out to our hostess that we had a father and son double in the boat. After carefully checking the names and the ages in the programme and looking at their shorts to see if there was indeed a likeness she transferred her attention to young Kenny Almand. Appreciating that there were other crews waiting for medals he explained that Willy had been to the Munich Olympics and that he was former Under-23 World Champion. When asked what other major regattas the crew had been to the organisers of Barnes and Mortlake International will be pleased to know they got a plug. Some of the sadder chuffers from the USA and Germany were seen to be taking down the details in the all too small "Notes" section of their programmes.

With a strong tailwind the Mortlake lightweights stood a chance in their singles against their hefty oppo. Nina White led off the start in the youngest heat over-rating her oppo. In the choppy water in Lane 2 she clipped a buoy and dropped to third at 750m. In a grandstand finish she raised the rate to 39 and a half and came back through to win in the last ten strokes.

The heavens then decided to open for the remainder of the day. Frank couldn't see the buoys in his singles race as his glasses had fogged up. The rain was so strong that even Russell "Fine Tune" Williams was not moved to bow-rig the coxed four for the big show-down against Sons. The much hyped race pitting Sons and Quintin next to each other ended up with Sons beating Quintin by less than a second with a very slippy composite from Tegel winning the heat in the fastest race of the day.

In the E fours Quintin had to find a substitute cox as Hilary was off finding dry clothes having been soaked coxing a Long Beach composite crew. The final two rows for the Quintin squad were Dave in his B single who took a number of scalps and Graham and Roger's pair who had a strong row on D pairs overlapping with the winners in the fastest heat.

To cap a successful weekend we didn't even have to move the VIII and the fours from the first positions they were placed in on the trailer.

*The Undertaker - never smiles and he's so big he could carry the coffins on his own. Nicknames by Lighthouse Productions Limited.

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