This Valentine’s Day, we hosted our first ever head race!

A head race is a time trial where boats are set off down a 5km course, one after the other, competing to the set the fastest time. We hosted 12 clubs, 70 boats, and 300 athletes competing across two divisions on the day. It featured athletes from the Universities of Bristol, Exeter, Swansea and Bournemouth, as well as other local clubs.

The fastest time was put down by the University of Bristol rowing an 8-man boat, taking them 15 minutes and 46 seconds. There were also exciting results from our Novice Men winning their category in their 4-man boat, which is promising for our National BUCS competition in May.

Running a head race was no mean feat, it required months of planning, safety briefings, and the co-operation of every member of our club. We demonstrated how well we could work together as a team to run such a large-scale event to a very high standard.

Everybody brought their own unique strengths to the event; The medals were designed and printed by Summer, an architecture student. One of the safety boats was driven by Thom, an optometry student. On the day there was also a small army of medical students scurrying around to keep the day running.

The feedback from the event was glowing, people said, “it was really well organised” and that they were “really impressed with the committee”, with many clubs requesting for the event to be run again in future years.

This marks a year of huge growth for the club. Running a head race demonstrates our society to other universities as a serious rowing club. This event will help provide much needed funds to grow the club further.

We’re proud to have launched the first 5km Head Race in the South West. Many clubs in the South West, ours included, will have used this race as a benchmark for the nationally acclaimed Head of the River Race in London that our Senior Men's 8 will be rowing in at the end of March.

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by Joseph Fowler