ROWING:FORTUNE FAVOURS the brave. Running a head of the river for this time of the year involves a little luck, and the Muckross head tomorrow at the National Rowing Centre looks set to get just the break in the windy weather it needs.
The event, a rolling “head” (time trial) from 10 am until 3 pm, has drawn quite a strong entry. Crews from Trinity College – including men’s and women’s eights – and Neptune join a big Munster contingent in the draw.
“We’re delighted with the entry,” said Tim O’Shea of Muckross yesterday. “We have over 240 crews.”
The forecast of suitable weather is pleasing, as Muckross had to postpone this event in the last two years because of awful weather.
Poor weather did not, however, prevent a huge crowd turning out for the funeral of Tom Tuohy in Galway this week.
The NUIG authorities and the college’s rowing fraternity turned out in big numbers and provided a fine send off for the man who headed up the rowing programme at the college.
One of the rising stars of the sport, Holly Nixon, has been named as Afloat Rower of the Year for 2011. Nixon, who turned 18 on Wednesday, brought a wait of more than twice her age to an end when she took silver at the World Junior Rowing Championships at Dorney Lake in August. Ireland had not medalled at the event from the first entry in the Fisa Junior Championships in 1973.
Nixon is a product of Portora rowing club and a credit to the excellent work of coach Derek Holland, who heads up the junior rowing programme in the national system. The Devenish College student will do her A Levels next year and has received rowing scholarship offers from colleges in the United States.
American universities now have a major intake of the best young rowers from around the world – so much so that Australia this year held under-23 national trials in the US.
Laura D’Urso, who finished fourth in an Ireland double with Lisa Dilleen at the World Junior Championships in 2009, has been a major success at Clemson College. In June, she was named in the collegiate All American second team. She came home the following month to take the senior single sculls title – but admitted her time in a single in America was extremely limited as she is streamed towards sweep rowing.
An excellent article in the current edition of Fisa’s emagazine documents the burgeoning power of American universities for rowing systems outside the US.
In Britain, meanwhile, rowers Katherine Grainger and Anna Watkins were shortlisted for the Sports Journalists’ Association Team of the Year Award.
Grainger and Watkins successfully defended their double sculls’ World Championship title this year.
