Good to see so many Stortford paddlers turning out for this race despite the persistent cold rain. | 8 miles & 6 portages: Senior K2 - Jacque Cayford & Dave Cayford 11th (1:30:30), Kerstin Queenie & Robin Dromard 12th (1:35:03) Mens K1 - Wayne Stevens 5th (1:40:43) Vet Mens K1 - Dave Hallam 1st (1:08:02), Chris Sze 3rd (1:12:45), Ricky White 5th (1:17:26), Mike Toomey 8th (1:20:06), Kevin Warbrick 9th (1:21:44) 6 miles & 4 portages: u16 Boys K1 - Murdo White 4th (1:01:12), James Daly 7th (1:12:46) Ladies K1 - Lexie White 4th & 1st junior (1:00:14), Siobhan Latham 8th (1:13:44), Catherine Robinson 9th (1:19:01) u16 Girls K1 - Yazmin Layzell 1st (1:06:26), Isabelle Crawford 2nd (1:06:27), Jess Gaynor 3rd (1:19:26) Marathon C2 - Malcolm Duckworth & Gary Aldam 2nd (56:11); Paul Surrage & Richard Baker 4th (58:15) 3 miles & 2 portages: u14 Boys K1 - Connor Higgins 5th (29:40), Luke Sellstrom 6th (30:35), James Sellstrom 8th (36:32), Cory Jones 10th (40:12) u14 Girls K1 - Emilia Boylan 1st (30:00) u12 K1 - Eilidh White 5th & 1st girl (36:15) Full results can be seen on the FRA Winter Series results page. You will also find the series results for each class so far. Those who have competed in three or more races during the season will be eligible to win a series award. The club again took second place behind Chelmsford CC, but comfortably ahead of Barking CC. In terms of points from novice paddlers, however, BSCC were the highest scorers, leaving us strong favourites to win the Dick Grieve Trophy. Thanks to Chris & Maria Sze for the use use of their photos |
9 miles: Senior K2 - David Gurney & Matthew Ross [BAD] 10th (1:24:21), Jacque Cayford & Dave Cayford 11th (1:34:49) Mens K1 - Joe Fitzpatrick 3rd (1:14:37), Wayne Stevens 5th (1:41:28) Vet Mens K1 - Danny Beazley 1st (1:10:30), Dave Hallam 2nd (1:15:12), Chris Sze 3rd (1:19:54), Mike Toomey 7th (1:26:06), Steve Whipp 8th (1:28:12), Brian Owen 11th (1:56:45) 6 miles: u16 Boys K1 - Murdo White 1st (56:48), James Daly 5th (1:08:33), Luis Blanco 7th (1:17:47) Ladies K1 - Octavia Abbott 3rd (57:10), Lexie White 6th (1:03:03), Melanie Bennett 8th (1:03:53), Catherine Robinson 10th & 1st Paddle-Ability (1:22:02) u16 Girls K1 - Yazmin Layzell 3rd (1:04:44), Isabelle Crawford 4th (1:06:38) Marathon C2 - Gary Aldam & Malcolm Duckworth 2nd (1:01:42)
On-water safety cover for the event was again very ably provided by Herts Boat Rescue. Fortunately, the day was largely dry and even sunny for the most part, though still bitterly cold. The rain held off until the start of prize-giving.
Full race results on the FRA website. See photos of the Stortford race in Angela's Flickr album and from Maria and Chris via Facebook. There is also a video of the race from Chris's boat.
Loads of new faces on the Stortford team at the Chelmsford Hasler - Luke & James Sellstrom, Sam Twaddle, Pablo & Luis Blanco, Robbie Toomey, Brian Owen, Olivia Cutts and Hudson Owers were all racing for the first time. The trailer was completely full! There were 238 competitors, with a particularly high turnout of Div 9s which caused this division to have split starts.
The year's Hasler racing culminated at the finals in Worcester on the River Severn. A team of 31 from BSCC made the long journey to represent the club. There were 728 competitors taking part, meaning that race starts typically had 30, 40, or more, boats starting together (over 50 in the case of Div 5).
Everyone put in a huge effort. Matt was the fastest Stortford K1 over the long course (7th Div 2). Wayne was 5th in Div 9 and achieved a promotion. Murdo and Oscar's times were only fractionally off promotion in Div 7 (9th and 10th respectively) in a photo finish. With only one medallist (Josh, silver in Div 3), it was not immediately apparent from the individual results that, as a whole, the BSCC team had done extremely well - achieving a 6th place overall. This was out of 38 clubs taking part, each one of whom had earned their place in the finals by their performance in the various regional races across the season.
DOUBLES - 12 miles, 2 portages Div 2: Danny Beazley & James Smythe 4th (1:31:58) 8 miles, 1 portage Div 5: Mike Panrucker & Ant Wright 23rd (1:12:00) 4 miles, 0 portages Div 7: Anne Barnett & Nathan Lambert 29th (37:43) Div 8: Jacque Cayford & Dave Cayford 12th (37:48), Malcolm Duckworth & Gary Aldam 14th (38:43) Div 9: Kaitie Owen & Emilia Boylan 6th (39:45), Euan Caton & Connor Higgins 12th (48:02) SINGLES - 12 miles, 2 portages Div 2: Matt Parkes 7th (1:34:34), Joe Surrage 14th (1:37:31) Div 3: Josh Young 2nd (1:37:51) 8 miles, 1 portage Div 4: Chris Sze 27th (1:13:21) Div 5: David Gurney 33rd (1:17:43), Octavia Chambers 41st (1:20:13), Mike Toomey 46th (1:27:36), Ricky White (rtd) Div 6: Lexie White 14th (1:19:16) 4 miles, 0 portages Div 7: Murdo White 9th (37:30), Oscar Toomey 10th (37:31) Div 8: Yazmin Layzell 35th (52:18) Div 9: Wayne Stevens 5th (41:32), Siobhan Latham 23rd (50:50), Jessica Gaynor 28th (54:05) LIGHTNINGS u10 Girls: Eilidh White 9th (28:04), Gemma Beazley 14th (31:02) See:
The host club had a beautiful new clubhouse about 100m downstream from the original club which had been built by its members over last two years and largely funded by a grant from the local parish council. The new club included a camping area with electrical hook up points for those with caravans or camper vans and more than adequate space for the rest of us in tents. There was also a large patio area with plenty of seating for people to eat at of have a drink. We were welcomed on arrival by the president of the club and after taking a short walk down the road to get some dinner we joined him in the Kastelse Kayak Klub bar. We shared a few stories about races he had done in the UK and some of us had done abroad in the past and then he proudly showed us the DW K1 team trophy that his club had won in 1998. A trophy that will hopefully have Bishops Stortford’s name on it in 2017.
We then put half of our boats on the Kastelse Kayak Klub trailer and just took Dave’s car to the start which was an easy 11km drive. The race started at 2:00pm on a wide dead straight canal with all classes starting on one mass start. Joe F and Matt made the large front group to the first portage which was about 2.5km from the start with Danny in the second group just behind. Joe S was on his own between groups with Dave behind and Heidi and Chris together further back. After the portage the front group split with Matt in the second half and Joe F off the back and quickly caught by Danny’s group. There was 4km between the first and second portage and still the wide canal remained dead straight. Once back on the water after the second portage the large groups were reducing to 3’s and 4’s with Matt in group 2, Danny in group 3 and Joe F in group 4. The race continued on for another 3km to the next portage and still there was no sign of a bend in the canal. After portage 3 it was 3.5km to the most crucial point in the race, the 1.2km portage from the large navigation canal to the river Kastelse Kayak Klub is based on. Having said that, it could be argued the first bend in the canal 1.5km before this portage was the crucial point. Would people still remember how to use their rudders, would the rudder cable have seized through lack of use, would they get giddy negotiating a slight left hand bend. Despite all the excitement of this slight kink in the canal, we all made it safely around this bend. The long portage was along a very smooth flat cycle path with many locals fitting skateboard wheels to the deck of their boats and dragging them along the path. This was a good opportunity for those that could run well to bridge the gap to the group in front. Danny closed the gap to Matt passing the K2 that had been in his group and getting in with the top junior K1 a few metres down on Matt and the other K1 from the 2nd group. The few metres gap was closed quickly and soon Matt and Danny were working together and dropped the other two Belgium K1’s on the shallow fast flowing upstream 5km section to the finish line ensuring the fight for 5th and 6th place would be an all Stortford affair. Dave overtook Joe F and closed the gap to less than a minute on Joe S by the end of the run and Heidi also run well over this portage putting plenty of time between her and Chris (still recovering from a knee injury). The last 5km was the section of river that had been damaged by flooding 2 weeks ago and had largely been drained and filled with the sandy soil from the banks. This section was also fairly fast flowing against us and seemed extra tough having spent the previous 15km on deep wide canal. This section did somehow seem to suit the Stortford paddlers with all of us gaining places. This could be due to the weed on our own canal creating a similar effect on water depth and drag. ![]() Matt was first home coming a very respectable 5th with Danny on his wash in 6th but taking 1st veteran. Joe S was the next Stortford boat home 17th across the line and 9th in the senior men’s K1 followed a few minutes later by Dave 20th across the line but taking 2nd super veteran K1. Heidi was next to cross the line winning a very impressive silver medal in the senior ladies K1 and 28th overall with Joe F finishing 29th overall and 13th in the senior men’s K1. Chris was 31st across the line and 5th in the super veterans K1. After a quick shower Danny and Dave retrieved the car left at the start whilst everyone else made the most of their free drinks tokens. Boats were loaded on the cars and tents etc packed in the boot and following prize giving we left the club at 6pm arriving home around 11:30pm. This was an extremely success club social trip with the added bonus of a great race. It was also extremely cheap and an event it would be great to see many more of you attend next year. We extend our gratitude to Kastelse Kayak Klub for the great hospitality and for looking after us so well. Results:
Senior Men’s K1 Matt Parkes – 5th - 1:34:48 Joe Surrage – 9th – 1:41:42 Joe Fitzpatrick – 13th – 1:56:46 Senior Ladies K1 Heidi White – 2nd – 1:56:45 Veterans K1 Danny Beazley – 1st – 1:34:51 Super Veterans K1 Dave Hallam – 2nd – 1:45:22 Chris Sze – 5th – 2:03:25 The weekend of 23rd and 24th July saw a reasonable size team from Bishops Stortford head to the National Marathon Championships which this year were held on the River Thames at Reading. Saturday’s racing is all K1 / C1 starting with the Lightnings at 9:00am and finishing with the Veterans at 2:40pm with two other starts in between at 10:00 and 11:40. Sundays race is all K2 / C2 following the same format but finishing with one of the largest and hotly contested events of the weekend, the Mixed K2. Although there were five National Championship medals won by the Club, Toby Booth’s 5th place in Under 14 K1 (out of 28 entries) and Joe Fitzpatrick & Heidi White’s 9th place in mixed K2 (out of 58 entries) were the outstanding results of the weekend, beating many crews who on paper were faster than themselves. Although there were some very good results on Saturday in the extremely hot and humid conditions we had to wait until the last set of races for Joe Surrage to start the medals coming with a good 2nd place in the Over 34 Vet Men K1. Danny Beazley then followed up with a gold in the Over 39 Vet Mens K1. Sunday saw slightly cooler and more pleasant racing conditions and Toby Booth partnering Lewis Smith from Lincoln won an impressive bronze medal in the Under 14 boys K2. The final medals of the weekend were won by Danny Beazley and James Smythe (racing in a Bishops Stortford vest for the first time) who finished a very close 2nd in the Vet Mens Over 34 K2. Well done to all who raced - the Club finished in 17th place overall out of 54 clubs. It would be lovely to break into the top 10 next year with a larger attendance from the Club.
This was the first Hasler race run by the club at this venue. Not only was the total number of entries (196) the greatest seen at this venue, the club's own team of 45 was the largest put out by Bishops Stortford CC for many years. The various divisions were split between morning and afternoon starts, enabling club members to both compete and also to serve as marshals or in other volunteer roles during the other part of the day. The home team took an impressive proportion of the trophies. There were gold medals for Megan (promoted to Div 6), Oscar (to Div 7), Richard W (promoted to Div 3), Emilia & Kaitie; Silvers for Matt, Anne & Nathan, Paul & Richard B, Gemma, and Jack; and Bronze medals for Ryewin, Gary & Malcolm. Paul & Richard also won Fastest Canadian. Update: A further promotion was announced after the race for Octavia to Div 5. Overall the Stortford team came 2nd to Leighton Buzzard CC. This means that we have finished the season in fourth place in the league and will be going to the Hasler Finals at Worcester in September.
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