CHAIRMAN’S VIEW

Club Pride Day on Sunday 24th October was a huge success with a large team of enthusiastic members from across the Club joining together to tackle various tasks and tidy up in and around the clubhouse. With so many new faces at the Club, I was pleased to take the opportunity to introduce myself and some other committee members. I would like to thank everyone who gave up their Sunday morning to lend a hand. I would also like to record my thanks to those who helped to organise the day, identify the work to be done and ensure that we had the right tools available. This was led by Lizzie Cottrell and Eddie Markes – thank you.

Having taken a few months rest Mark Lucani, our recently retired captain, has kindly agreed to coordinate our work to reconnect with former Club Members with whom we have lost touch. Our aim is to encourage as many as possible to re-join LRC and be part of our community again even if not able to play an active role. Our initial approach is to identify and contact those who have lived at the Club. The Membership Sub-Committee has developed plans to help us connect with former Resis and we have already spoken to a small number to reach out to their peer group. There is an underlying rationale for starting with the Resis as we look to fund and undertake work to redevelop the kitchen and refurbish the common parts before giving each room a facelift. In line with the initiative, if you are in contact with one or more of our “lost members” please suggest that they consider renewing their membership and acquaintance with LRC. If you are able to help Mark in his work, please contact him through the Club.

During the summer, the total membership of LRC exceeded 800 for the first time in recent memory. Whilst there is a drop off in August each year, we are now well ahead of where we were last year as the Club continues to grow. Each month the committee receives a summary report from Jessica Salter who works tirelessly behind the scenes as Membership Secretary. In addition to her day job Jessica is in the process of migrating our membership data from our ageing and esoteric Access database to the new My Clubhouse system. Please bear with us and support Jessica as required through the process.

Simon Harris
Chairman, London Rowing Club

ROWING REPORT

The last few weeks the squad have been busy with training, progressing both on and off the water, 5km testing, racing in the Wingfield Sculls and the Thames Embankment challenge as well as preparations and crews taking shape for the upcoming Fours Head.

Success seen at the Scullers Head was reinforced during this year's running of the Wingfield Sculls. The event, held over the Championship Course, is a highlight of the rowing and sculling calendar with entries limited to six selected scullers in the men’s and women’s events each.

*London's 2021 Wingfield Sculls competitors Rui Xu, Grace Bake, Nathan O’Reilly, Gregor Maxwell with Chief Coach Stu Heap (centre).*

The squad also recently took the opportunity to race at the Thames Embankment challenge. This event, run between Wandsworth and Harrods Wall, is relatively new and informal and is open to entries from Thames, Vesta and London. This year London boated men’s and women’s crews across a range of categories including: eights, quads and fours, with particularly strong results coming from the women’s coxed and coxless fours, and the men’s quad and coxed four.

The squad is now focused on this Saturday’s Fours Head (13th November), with twelve entries across men’s and women’s events which include new and returning faces. The squad continues to move forward and we are excited to see what results can be achieved in the winter months and races.

Fours head crews (13/11 starting at 10:45 am)

Men’s Champ 4x 6
Men’s Champ 4+ 29
Men’s Club 4x 69
Men’s Club 4- 156
Men’s Club 4- 159
Men’s Club 4- 176
Men’s Club 4+ 195
Women’s Club 4x 268
Women’s Club 4- 297
Women’s Club 4- 299
Women’s Club 4- 303
Women’s Club 4+ 371

Vets Fours head crews (14/11 starting at 12:30 pm)

Masters B 4x 7
Masters C 4x 18
Masters D 4x 35
Masters A 4- 45
Masters C 4- 55
Masters C 4- 58
Masters E 4x 64
Masters E 4x 74
Masters E 4- 92
Masters A 4+ 142
Masters G 4x 153

**STOP PRESS**

x3 LRC Fours Head wins on Saturday followed by x3 LRC Vets Fours Head wins on Sunday. There will be a full report in the December edition of The London Roar.

Matt Reeder
LRC, Vice-Captain

DATES FOR YOUR DIARY

See more detail for these events, visit our Calendar of Events…

SAFETY FIRST

It has been noted in the recent weeks as activity has picked up at the club that some individuals need to tighten up on their safety protocols.

Check your hull before your outing, there is a check list in every bay, but please pay special attention to the following:

The bow ball, if it is not secure, has deteriorated, and will not protect what a hull hits, this must be remedied prior to the outing.
Heel restraints, check the shoes are securely fixed to the footplate and that the heel restraints are independent and capable of taking a violent tug with the heel rising no more than the ball of foot; imagine the force you would exert if the hull capsized.
Hatch covers or under seat buoyancy bags, without these a swamping can quickly move to a sinking.
You must log your outing using the link from the QR code on the side door of the clubhouse, you can save this URL to your phone as a desktop item; here is the link: LRC Outing Log

For those booking hulls via FitClub, the log is in addition to that booking. The outing log is a PLA requirement and must be available with the correct information when they request it.

Every hull must carry a mobile phone in a water-tight pouch that permits use when in the boat or water, this included hulls being coached.

To summon emergency help call 999 or make an emergency call from the locked screen and ask for the coastguard. Be prepared with your position, situation and assistance required. Location vs major landmark, eg “Upper tidal Thames, down from Barnes Bridge near the Middlesex bank”. The situation, “Our coach who is male aged 35 has collapsed in their launch, they are not responsive, and they are not breathing, we will move the launch with them to the Middlesex bank. We are attempting CPR”. Assistance required, “We need immediate help for the casualty”.

In all emergencies focus on CPR while summoning help if the launch or hull is in a safe location on the river and then look at moving to the bank while continuing CPR. Make for the nearest land or landing stage with a casualty, when on or by the river the RNLI will always be the first emergency unit on site and can if necessary help while you are in the middle of the river. Obviously the CPR aspect has to be tailored if in a smaller less stable hull, ie 2x.

Following on from that, please refresh your knowledge of CPR First aid - CPR - NHS (www.nhs.uk). Also a reminder that we have an AED “defibrillator” in our gym that does not require any previous training and will only shock the casualty if its systems detect the need. The sooner a casualty of the form above in the coach or sculler situations receives CPR and an AED the better the outcome.

Ben Helm
Safety Officer, London Rowing Club

CLUB PRIDE DAY

Ten o’clock on the 24th October saw the Long Room fuller than it has been seen in more than eighteen months. Teeming is the word, with club members new and old, all eager and only a few under orders, ready to lend their muscle and minds to partake in this Club event. I would estimate that about a hundred members were present. First though, the opportunity was taken to introduce some of the Club Officers and ask for volunteers who might be willing to help with the future management of the Club.

That done and dusted, control was handed over to the wonderful Lizzie Cottrell who had organised the various tasks. She had done her prep work really well, with allocations of labour and equipment all pre-planned. Having got everybody's attention, her army got to work as she shepherded bodies towards task leaders and the Long Room was suddenly and miraculously empty.

Generally, the squad were assigned with boat bay duties. Cleaning the bays, sizing blades, removing old stickers, carrying out a safety audit, marking up racks and re-marking sculls were just some of the many duties assigned in this area. The more elderly members of the Club were on gardening duties and most had brought some useful tool or other. The balcony was cleaned and weeded, all the outer external perimeter of the club and gym were defoliated and tidied up and the majority of gutters and roofs checked and cleared. Internally, the brass on the bar was cleaned and polished and the erg mats were washed and de-sweatified - how thorough can you get?

Apologies if I have not mentioned all the jobs but suffice it to say a great job was done by all.

Drinks in the bar at lunchtime were spoiled by someone insisting on carrying out a Fire Drill which, nevertheless, took place successfully.

A hugely successful day with so many members coming together with a common purpose. Someone has even suggested we do this bi-annually!

Well done and thanks to all.

Eddie Markes

IT’S PARTY TIME

We are delighted to announce two Club Dinners coming up in the next couple of months.

First, we have the Christmas Supper on the 9th December. The evening will start with drinks from 6:30 pm and dinner served at 8:00 pm. Numbers are limited to a hundred but, subject to priority being given to members attending, family, friends, spouses, partners and housemates will be most welcome. Dress code will be jackets but no ties and sparkles are encouraged!

Tickets will cost £35 for current Squad members and Young Irregulars. For all other members and their guests, tickets will be £45.

The second dinner will be the Annual Dinner which will be taking place on 21st January. Full details of this will be sent out to everyone in due course but, for the moment, put the date in your diary as something to look forward to in the post-Christmas period.

NEW MEMBERS

We would like to welcome the following new members to the Club:

Zac Baxter
Vicky Brock
Catherine Edwards
Rachel Evans
Simon Ganem
Arun Grewal
Andrew Henderson
Angela Hitchens
Imogen Hyde
Lily Lesser
Mark Magill
Luke Morgan
Emma Widdowson
Bryan Williams
Claudia Williams
Huw Williams

We hope you will enjoy being part of the London Rowing Club community and will help us build an ever happier and more successful club.

We are always pleased to have more members so, if you know of anyone who think might like to join the Club, please either let us know or encourage them to get in touch with us themselves.

There is information on becoming a member on our website: https://www.londonrc.org.uk/membership-enquiries or you can contact the Club’s Membership Secretary, Jessica Salter, whose email address is membership@londonrc.org.uk

Andrew Boyle
Honorary Secretary, London Rowing Club

LIFE IN RESIS IN THE LATE 1970S

The Clubhouse was my home from July 1976 until March 1979. In those days, there were six or seven bedrooms on the top floor, plus a bathroom and separate WC. On the floor below there were just three resi bedrooms plus bathroom/WC. The rest of the second floor comprised a flat occupied by the Brennan family who ran the bar and catering at the Club. Cleaning of the common parts was done by Lillian Eagle MBE (aka "Mrs E.") who began her job as cleaner-housekeeper at the Club in 1959 and who would not tolerate any mud on the stairs or mess in the corridors. All lettings were arranged by the formidable John Pepys (Club Secretary 1977, Treasurer 1978-80) who eschewed any form of written tenancy agreement.

For the first few months I occupied room no. 4 on the top corridor, before moving into the huge room at the upstream end of that corridor (I believe this room now comprises the “coach’s flat”). This room was dual-aspect, and from my bed I had a fine view of the river all the way to Hammersmith. All the bedrooms looked out over the back of the Clubhouse (in those days the houses at the back had outdoor WCs and, in the morning, you would see the occupiers wandering out to the loo in their pyjamas!). Nothing could quite beat standing out on the balcony in the fresh morning air looking out across the river, at the start of every day.

The conditions were rather Spartan. We had no central heating, so we relied on electric heaters. There was no kitchen in Resis in those days, so in my room I had an electric kettle, toaster and a two-ring camping-gas stove (I used this only in emergency, relying instead on meals provided by friends or family, or purchased at the local ‘greasy spoon’). In the absence of a fridge, it was hard to keep milk or food fresh for long, especially in warmer weather. There was a pay-phone on the second-floor corridor, used for incoming and outgoing calls, which would ring incessantly to the exasperation of residents nearby.

The corridors and communal bathrooms were unheated, but there was always a copious supply of hot water (we had no showers, only bathtubs). The bathroom on the second floor had a dodgy lock and would often jam (as my wife discovered to her cost a few years’ later on our Wedding Day, when she retired there to change out of her wedding-dress!).

Notwithstanding these hardships, I had a good time there. I enjoyed setting off from the Clubhouse in the morning, on my way to work in the West End via Putney Bridge station or the number 22 bus. As a resident, one never took for granted the ever-changing life of the river, the tides and the river-birds. The rent was cheap and the location incomparable. Above all I enjoyed the camaraderie of the resident community at LRC. We all had radios and record-players, so there was plenty of music echoing around Resis in the evenings and at weekends, creating a pleasant atmosphere akin to a student hall of residence.

The majority of residents were, like me, in our early twenties and competing in the Club’s senior crews, but some residents were a good deal older. In my time the residents included (so far as I can recall):

Bobby Carpmael (son of Farn)
Tony La Roche, who introduced me to Resis but who sadly died after a long illness in May 1979
the Macdonald brothers, Donald and Hugh, whose respective bedrooms were accessed via plastic strip curtains, which they tastefully installed! (Donald later came to fame as President of OUBC in the 'Oxford Mutiny' episode described in "True Blue")
Nick Pilling
Tim Webb
Keith Mason (Captain of LRC 1986-7)
Maurice Rayner (Secretary 1979-82, Treasurer 1995-2001)
Keith Ticehurst (Captain 1979-82)
Greg Anson

Jeremy Hudson
Membership Sub-Committee member

The London Roar would welcome more articles by members about their time living in Resis, whether a long time ago or recently. If you are interested in writing such an article, please email the editor, Miles Preston at miles.preston@londonrc.org.uk

LRC ASIA PACIFIC REUNION

We recently received an inspirational contribution from one of our overseas members, Rees Ward, coincidentally also a former Resis. It perfectly captures the bonds of friendship and lasting memories created by the experience of rowing and shared endeavours. Here is his message:

“At 1:00 am Saturday 6th November UK Time, a small but elite band of London Rowing Club 2005-2010 era alumni assembled a virtual reunion on the other side of the world.

From Sunset Hill in Seattle, the famed LRC Thames Cup 2006 six-man, former resi and Durham Uni legend that is B3n Gr33n motivating the group with talk of his latest handstand push-up routines and explaining the complicated life of a global Amazon executive living in the shadow of Mt Rainier regularly krumping at various Nirvana-esque grunge concerts now that lockdowns have ended there.

From California's Golden Gate Bridge, UCLA's Bryan Kitch and Cal's Peter Frings now live very close to each other in Pacific Heights, voted one of the 15 most prestigious residential neighbourhoods in the San Francisco Bay Area, and that their children go to the same pre-school and that their kids' kindergarten teacher is coincidentally the exact same teacher they both had growing up there.

From his 5-star mansion in Lakeway Texas, Mike Kerrigan forwent a wild night out on 6th Street in Austin, to update the group on his latest Strava PR awards, his new wake-surfing boat that can sometimes be a challenge to dock off the lakes of the Colorado River and some late-night bar recommendations in the South of Market district for Mssrs Kitch and Frings.

From Australasia, another former LRC resi, Rees Ward in Auckland New Zealand, was three months into a strict COVID lockdown of that city, sick of lockdown erging and was looking forward to getting back to Friday morning rowing training with his Auckland "Michelin Men" veterans rowing eight and his sadness about not being in Melbourne for the usual Head of the Yarra regatta/ HOY there, a very fit-looking Nathan Gibbs beamed in from Queensland and spoke of his recent 1,311km charity bike ride from Brisbane to Longreach whilst Murray Keeble skited about having the whole of the Yarra River to himself to single scull along over lockdown and how he was looking to set the fastest time down the 9km Head of the Yarra on the 27th of November.

All in all, despite being on the other side of the world, London Rowing Club is still a very important part of our lives, particularly the people, the races and the camaraderie. We certainly all look forward to COVID lockdowns ending, visiting the UK again and being able to see our Europe-based LRC comrades either at HRR 2022, a Putney pub or, better yet, the LRC bar and balcony!”

Many thanks Rees and best wishes to all those mentioned.

Jessica Salter
Membership Secretary, LRC

CLUB OLYMPIANS

A list of the Club’s Olympic Games representatives, 1908 – 2016, promised in the August edition of The London Roar, will shortly be found in the History section of the Club’s website.

IN MEMORIAM

The Club lost two of its senior members in February – Simon Crosse, architect of the Club’s major development of the clubhouse in 1969-72 and an international oarsman; and William Rose, a member of the Club’s successful ‘Scullers’ Eights in the early 1950s who assembled a remarkable collection of Thames river craft and artefacts at his home in Shiplake. Tributes will be found shortly in our Obituaries section.

REPORTING SAFETY INCIDENTS

All members are reminded that if you are involved in or witness a water safety incident, you are required to report it on safety@londonrc.org.uk

The Club will file any necessary reports on your behalf with British Rowing and the PLA. Members should not submit reports directly to either body.

NOTE FROM THE EDITOR

My thanks to everyone who has contributed to this edition of the London Roar. If you have an idea for an article or would be interested in submitting a piece for inclusion in a future edition, please email me on miles.preston@londonrc.org.uk

Please do not submit an article without first liaising with me.

Miles Preston
Editor of The London Roar