Head racing season under way

The 46th Head of the Charles in Boston, United States did not attract the usual top international athletes due to the late running of this year’s World Rowing Championships, but numbers were up due to new events and extra input from collegiate crews.

The Head of the Charles is one of the biggest rowing events in the world and this year participation numbers went above 9,000 for the first time with 9,001 rowers competing. These rowers were spread across 1,920 boats coming from 21 countries, entered in 60 events.

Autumn in Boston can offer everything from snow storms to warm, sunny weather and this year’s sunny, but cool weather brought out record crowds of nearly 200,000 on the Saturday of the two day regatta. Sunday was cloudy with some rain and windless conditions which meant a number of course records fell. The University of Washington in winning the championship men’s eight came within .04 of a second of breaking the course record held by a previous US national team of 13:58.99. Princeton University lightweight men’s eight set a course record in their event of 14:09.9 with the Wisconsin University lightweight women also breaking the record in their women’s event. They finished in a time of 16:06.1. A total of 13 course records were broken on Sunday.

One of the few international elite athletes to race was Germany’s Marcel Hacker. Hacker is stepping back from international competition this year so he was not competing at the World Rowing Championships. Instead Hacker finished second to Michael Sivigny of the United States in the men’s single. The women’s single title went to Boston local Gevvie Stone.

For the first time an adaptive race, the LTA coxed four, was added to the programme with Head of the Charles executive director Fred Schoch saying the races went off without a hitch. “Three impressive crews battled for honours,” said Schoch. “The Regatta anticipates a larger field in 2011.”

The crew that received the most media attention was Iraq’s national team who were in the United States preparing for the Asian Games. The Iraqi rowers used the Head of the Charles as part of their preparation.

The Head of the Charles is an iconic race which covers the full gambit of the rowing world, from novice rowers through to Olympians and all ages and abilities. This year the oldest competitor to race over the 4.8km winding course was 83 year old Mary Elizabeth Stone who competed in the senior-veteran single. At the other end of the scale was 13 year old Aidan Crawford who competed in the directors’ challenge parent/child double.

Head racing continues this weekend with Italy’s Silverskiff and Great Britain’s Head of the River Fours.