Although the murky conditions cleared somewhat for the battle of the eights, what clarity emerged from the huge Tribesemen head of the river at Galway on Saturday was most notable in the smaller boats.
Teenage single scullers Owen Byrne (19) and Timmy Harnedy (16) can be particularly pleased. In the absence of Niall O'Toole, who did not travel, and with some of the other top lightweights at the training camp in Banyoles in Spain, heavyweight Albert Maher would have been expected to be the top sculler in the open section - but Commercial's Byrne, a lightweight whose studies preclude any participation in Spain, finished over a second ahead of him.
Ironically, on a weekend where youth was very much the keynote in the big entry, John Armstrong, whose age would give him something to spare even if Harnedy's and Byrne's were added together, came out as the top single sculler, the LVBC lightweight completing the course in 16 minutes 28.6 seconds.
Harnedy proved yet again what a superb job coaching job Dominic Casey continues to do at Skibbereen Rowing Club. The modest young man won the junior single scull, clocking 16:55.8 for the course - and, of course, Skibbereen won the junior eight as well.
The fact that the Cork juniors were only eight seconds slower than the senior Commercial eight told a large part of the story in the eights, which was overshadowed by the absence of the Neptune seniors - their top personnel were in Spain.
On Saturday Commercial were drawn first of the starters in the eights head, just ahead of Trinity, but in an effort to pull away from the college crew in the windswept early stage they hit the monument and their chances had gone - they came in well behind Trinity.
A composite crew of Noel Monahan, Ross Donovan, Albert Maher and James Lupton won the open quadruple sculls and Donovan and Monahan won the double.
Commercial's Ailish Houlihan carried off the women's open single scull.
The strong women's crews from University of Massachusetts as expected won the open and intermediate eights.
