July Newsletter

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Dear GRC Members,

It has been busy around the boathouse this month, and there are lots of amazing athletes, volunteers and club events to highlight!

1. Cut the Cake with GRC’s Summer Eights: Mayhem Regatta – July 22nd, 2023
2. High School Season Recap
3. Meghan Harris and Stephen Harris Represent Canada at CanAmMex and U23 Worlds
4. Summer Competitive Program Regatta Recap
5. Learn to Row Regatta Recap – July 8th, 2023
6. Moonlight Row – August 31st, 2023
7. Volunteers Needed for UoG Regatta – September 23rd, 2023

Cut the Cake with GRC’s Summer Eights: Mayhem Regatta

The Mayhem Regatta was a huge success! With four 8+s on the water, plus a little mayhem, everyone enjoyed a beautiful Saturday morning. The crews started off racing 1000m to see who would cross the line first. Finals A and B were done to finish off the morning, with the Tony Biernaki coming out on top! Thank you to everyone for coming out and supporting the event, and thank you to those who organized the event: Jessica Wilson-Sterling, Pearl Schachter (Regatta Organizers), Jane McKinnon-Wilson, Nancy Kieler, Henry Kieler, Peggy Buchanan, Heather Kooistra, Martha can Berkel (GRC Social Committee Chairs)

High School Season Recap

This high school season has been over for a few weeks now, but many athletes have continued their successful season and joined the Competitive Progam for the summer! 

After their hard work in winter erg training in our boathouse, our juniors attacked the regatta season with great enthusiasm!

The spring racing season kicked off with the Row Ontario Small Boat trials held in Welland and the annual Mother’s Day Regatta in St Catharines. The Small Boat trials served as a selection regatta for the junior national team and Meghan Harris finished as the 6th junior in a 1x field that came from across Ontario, Quebec, and Eastern Canada. 

Due to illness, only 3 athletes raced the Mother’s Day Regatta but braved the St Catharines wind and waves to make their mothers proud.  In the senior 1x, Jenna Babulic placed 6th overall and in the junior 1x, Rowan Conrad was 4th, just missing the podium. Rowen then paired up with Siri Borden in the Jr 2x for Siri’s first-ever rowing race. They finished 9th overall in what was later described by most competitors as surfing not rowing due to the waves! An excellent performance by all.

The following weekend, crews traveled to Welland for the South Niagara Invitational. Saturday’s weather was dominated by intense downpours and cold.  Rowen returned to race the 1x, finishing 10th overall. Despite the rain, our day had a silver lining as Siri and Rowen paired up again in the junior 2x. They were the last boat out of the heats to make it into finals, but in the final, they rowed through all but one other boat and rowed to 2nd place! Sunday brought beautiful weather and the chance for Ethan Steele to race the Sr 1x event and immediately following that race, jump into the athlete favourite, the mixed 2x race with Reyna Rintoul.  Ethan and Reyna raced extremely well finishing 3rd in their heat and just missing the final for a 7th overall placing. Not to be outdone, Jenna and Meghan raced the competitive W Sr 1x event with Jenna placing 10th overall and Meghan capturing the bronze medal.

The Canadian Secondary School Rowing Championships was the final regatta of the season. Friday had crews racing in a time-trial format followed by heats and semis on Saturday and finals Sunday. Patience was the word of the weekend due to long delays and the eventual cancellation of racing on Saturday afternoon due to wind and unsafe conditions.  Although our juniors and our Mixed 2x did not make it past the time trials and heats, it was an exciting event to participate in as they raced crews from all over Canada and the United States. The senior girls really shone showing that they could manage the tough wind and waves to take on the best senior scullers in Canada. Jenna finished 10th out of 33 scullers and Meghan went on to capture the bronze medal to finish off her high school career. This was a proud moment that was then topped off with a selection to the Junior National Team to race at the Can-Am Mex regatta in Sarasota Florida, July 14 –  15th.

Catch all our juniors in action this summer racing the CORA regattas, the Row Ontario Championships and Canadian Henley.  They are a fantastic group of young athletes and continually made us proud with their enthusiasm, supportiveness, and humour. No doubt they will continue to “sparkle” throughout the remainder of the season.

Alexandra Glista and David Barker
High School Coaches

Guelph Athletes Represent Canada

A huge congratulations to Meghan Harris for representing Canada for the first time as a member of the Junior National Team and racing at the Can-Am Mex Regatta July 14th-15th. Meghan captured gold in the women’s quad and bronze in the women’s double! Congratulations Meghan! 

Stephen Harris once again represented Canada at the U23 Rowing World Championships. After capturing bronze in the lightweight men’s single last summer Stephen is again racing down the course, but as many may know funds have been cut for lightweight rowing. This means Stephen’s trip is self-funded and he would appreciate the support of his community to help him on his travels. No donation is too small, if you are interested in donating please follow this link. 

Summer Regatta Recap

Dominion Day: On July 1st, 24 of our competitive rowers traveled by ferry to Toronto’s Centre Island to represent GRC at the Dominion Day Regatta – the first appearance for the club in over ten years! 

GRC’s competitive rowers spent the day racing 1000m sprints (or 840m, depending on who you ask) dodging buoys, canoes, and crews from other clubs. Our athletes delivered exciting performances and displayed good sportsmanship throughout the day. 

With 21 entries across junior, u23, senior & master race categories, the club came home with 7 wins! For their efforts on the day, first place finishers earned an updated 2023 version of Dominion Day’s traditional silver goblet – a travel mug.

GRC’s winning crews included James Rourke (U23 Men’s 1x), Paige Burns (Sr Women’s 1x), Kurtis Sobkowich (Sr Men’s 1x), Andrew Borden (Masters Men’s 1x), Paige Burns, Mayva Hergel, Madeline Minnes and Abbegayle Smith (Sr Women’s 4x), Thomas Lacheur, Cedric Pecora, Jacob Lohrenz, Connor Wideman, Kiera Hickie-Bentzen (U23 Mens’ 4+), and Kira Darou-Santos, Natalie Miners, Kaitlyn O’Donnell, Lia Snucins, and Abbegayle Smith (Sr Women’s 4+).

Of special note were our two GRC summer eights, a men’s and women’s senior crew on each side, that raced hard and found themselves in the mix with other clubs, resulting in 4th and 2nd place finishes respectively.

Well done to everyone who raced for GRC, thank you to our volunteers, and a special shout out to our new rowers, fresh out of novice, who lined up at the start line for the first time in club colours: Noémie Arsenault, Ella Stoppenbrink, and Jasmine Pecora. 

Learn to Row Regatta Recap

The Learn to Row Regatta was a big success and a lot of fun. LTR crews got to show off their skills and practice racing down the course! 
        

The LTR program is such an important part of the GRC and would not be possible without the hard work of coaches and volunteers. Thank you to everyone who puts their energy and time into making it happen!

Thank you:

  • Bob Richardson 
  • Reona Richardson 
  • Wes Sterling
  • Jim Wilson 
  • Joel Wilson
  • Andre Spekkens 
  • Heather Kooistra 
  • Peggy Buchanan 
  • Stephanie Ferguson 
  • Susan Healey 
  • Joanne Ryks
  • Odette Ziezold 
  • Kris Wei
  • Pat Weir 
  • Jane McKinnon Wilson 
  • Henry Kielar
  • Julie Horrocks 

And a huge thank you to Jessica Wilson-Sterling for taking on the lead for LTR this year.  Amazing job!!

Moonlight Row

Back by popular demand, there will be another Moonlight Row this summer! Join the GRC on August 31st for a row under the Blue Sturgeon Supermoon. Launch time will be 8:30pm followed by a campfire. There will be a sign up link sent at a late date, for now save the date and if you have any questions please email nancykielar13@gmail.com or isobellegray@gmail.com.

Volunteers Needed for UoG Regatta: September 23rd

The University of Guelph’s Gryphon Rowing Team will be hosting the 2023 Guelph Invitational. Events like these are not possible without the help of volunteers. Volunteers are needed to direct boat traffic, register crews, set up the event and more. A free lunch will be provided for volunteers on the day of the regatta. 

And for those in high school, this is a great opportunity to get volunteer hours, meet university coaches, and bring a friend into the world of rowing to get them volunteer hours too! This event cannot be run without volunteers! 

If interested please email Ashley Khosker: ashleykhosker@gmail.com.

That’s it for this month, see you at the lake!