Baker lands Ireland role

ROWING:ROWING IN Ireland has received a boost with the news Rob Baker, former acting chief coach at Cambridge University Boat Club, will take up a contract as Ireland under-23 coach. Because of the way in which granting is awarded, Baker's initial contract will only be to the end of this year.

Baker is in his early 30s, but he has been a coach at Cambridge for a number of years. He took over as acting chief coach after the departure of Duncan Holland last year and oversaw good results at Henley and in the Fours Head of the River.

Ireland’s peformance director Martin McElroy said he was very pleased to have landed a coach of such calibre, especially as it is his aim to build up strong links to university rowing. He said he would love to have Baker on a longer contract. “People like him don’t come along very often,” McElroy said.

The Galway man has now added two coaches to his team – Adrian Cassidy is the lead coach – and he hinted yesterday there may be another appointment. The last board meeting of Rowing Ireland heard that Sport NI may support a talent coach.

This is the weekend when droves of Irish rowers head for the massive Ghent regatta in Belgium. The upsurge in junior rowing in Ireland is well represented, with Skibbereen, Carlow, Commercial and Offaly all figuring strongly in the entries. Three of the six entries in the junior women’s eight tomorrow – Methodist, Belfast, Cork and Commercial – are Irish.

Orla Hayes heads up a strong list of Irish entries in the lightweight single scull, while Trinity and Commercial go in the men’s eight tomorrow.

One step up again, in terms of standard, is the Munich Junior regatta, and there will be much interest in how Ireland’s representatives, Lisa Dilleen and Laura D’Urso, do. Both are entered in the single scull, and they are are also entered as a double.

Back in Ireland, Sligo’s regatta is the sole event to go head-to-head with Ghent. Most university crews have been put on hold, now that exams have taken centre stage, but Queen’s University go into the break with a fillip to their morale. They had four medal-winning crews at the British University Championships in Nottingham last weekend.

The men’s novice eight and intermediate single sculler William Howell took gold; the women’s intermediate eight took silver; the men’s intermediate four came away with bronze. The men’s championship eight finished a close-up fourth to Durham in a final won by Cambridge, with Oxford Brookes second.

Wallingford Regatta also proved a happy hunting ground for the Irish, with Old Collegians/London composites winning the elite coxless fours and finishing first and second in the elite double sculls.