Lofty coxes the Vet VIII to gold at the FISA World Veteran Championships in Hazewinkel 2000

World Veteran Champions in VIIIs - full report on the FISA Vets at Hazewinkel.

Sunshine and appalling showers, media personality and World Champion Vet D sculler Willy Almand plus Roy Davies on Belgium's legendary customer service.

The Full Hazewinkel Report

This year's regatta was in Hazewinkel on the 8 lane course that has hosted one Senior and two Junior World Championships.

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.

A Pathe newsreel

Other Millenium News

Mark Chatwin won Senior 1 singles at Gloucester moving him to one pot off going Elite in a single season. Richard White and Ian Roots picked up Senior 1 VIIIs with Mark Banks, the Chief Coach for Juniors, making a comeback after 15 years with six of his charges from this season.

Ibis Head went ahead in the absence of the start marshalls who has installed themselves above Kew Road Bridge....

QBC moved up to Premiership in National Rowing League.This places us in the top 10 clubs in the country for men's rowing. Owing to Monmouth and Henley Vets not getting their results in we have been pipped to the post by Bedford RC in the race to be best overall club for Men's Veteran Rowing.

Helen Pritchard-Smith was the fastest J15 at Redgrave's Supersprints Event on the One Minute Erg Challenge. Helen only took up rowing last year and is taking part in her first sculling race at Henley Sculls on Saturday 28th October at 2:30pm racing in the WJ15 category.

Iron Man signs sponsorship deal with Timex Triathlon watches. Press Agent Lofty says Dov delighted with deal which will last for one pot / final..

Chatwin (AKA "Mouthy") shuts up for five minutes, and consequently pulls blonde.

Stourport - Quintin win the Victor Ludorum

Maggsy wins a qualifying point for Quintin. Everyone dreams of sinking the Steamer and being allowed to boat!

The Full Stourport Report

Quintin won its first Victor Ludorum since Molesey 1997 at this year's Stourport Regatta amassing a total of 31 points over the weekend.

The highlight of the weekend was the Senior 2 VIII winning the Sprint Regatta on the Sunday. In the first round they beat Minerva Bath by 2 and a 1/4 lengths. Kevin (Lofty), still reeling from his first ever disqualification the day before (whilst the VIII were leading Agecroft) undertook some fine tuning. Mickey's Big Hand and Little Hand were used to explain the rudiments of timing to Dov ("4 - watch your timing......4 - Do you want a f***ing watch?").

The semi-final saw the Quintin boys come up against Nephthys (the Oxford Lightweights Summer Squad) who had cleaned up in lower statuses the day before. Drawn on the town side Quintin were level approaching the bridge and the commentators said "Oxford" were in control. Egyptian pronunciation seemed to prove a problem during racing. A big push saw the Quintin edge a seat and then draw out to a half length victory on the line.

The other semi-final saw a rematch of the previous day's final - Agecroft vs Northwich. Northwich won by a length, stroked by Matt Langridge, a Henley Double Sculls finalist this year and World Junior Championships finalist the week before.

The Senior 2 VIII had rowed better in every race over the weekend and in the final they pushed out Northwich to win by just over a length. On the final day of the final club regatta of the year Tim Maggs had won a qualifying point for Quintin and achieved one of the Captain's targets for the year!

Mark Chatwin continued his remarkable season taking not only Senior 1 singles on both days, but winning Elite VIIIs and Senior 2 VIIIs for Quintin and stroke-steering a Senior 1 coxless four for Curlew RC on the Sunday.

Huw Jones and Alan Kirkpatrick won Senior 2 doubles in a large field in their fourth win of the season.

The veteran squad had a great weekend winning Vet B VIIIs and coxed IVs on both days, with young Chatwin jumping in at bow to win Elite VIIIs against Stourport. Huw and Alan (Alan finally in a Quintin vest!) teamed up with Richard Lonnergan and Lloydy to win C IVs adding to Hilary's considerable coxing tally for the season.

Lloydy picked up Veteran D singles both days beating Richard Edward's father, Tom in the process on the Saturday.

What did we get for the Victor Ludorum? No cash prize but a huge great mounted oar to display in the bar. All we need to do now is make sure Graham doesn't throw it on the fire.

Toby Lonnergan won J11 singles for Tideway Scullers and Hilary picked up another coxing pot for Bradford-on-Avon's Vet C IV+ on the Sunday as well.

Back to Millenium News

Angus Ford becomes Quintin's youngest member at 25 hours old. Proposed by the Captain and seconded by his father David Ford. Angus his mother, Marion, are now in training for Novice Coxed Mixed Doubles at Stourport Sprint Regatta 2007.

Maidenhead - 7 wins for Quintin

A fine series of wins across the range of squads. A fine win for the Senior 3 VIII stroked by Dov Ohrenstein, coached by John Peters.

Molesey - Quintin women win their first ever race!

Quintin women beat Wallingford A and Molesey A before losing to Parrs Priory in Novice Fours. The usual culprits picked up a load of gold Molesey medals to complete the bronze and silvers in the Molesey millenium collection.

Kingston - Novices no more

JP's novice boys recover from their Richmond crab-fest to grab a qualifying novice win.

Henley Veterans

The squad for Hazewinkel kicks off with wins in Vet B VIIIs, IVs and C IVs.

Radley Yardley Trophy

Quintin win 6-5

New Lady Jenny

New Empacher VIII - two careful races winning the Head and the Grand before becoming Quintin's flagship

New Janousek IV+

The "Phil Read" a club boat