News & Events
Cygnet Weekly News
29th March 2016
I hope everyone had a enjoyable and relaxing Easter and those who went afloat stayed afloat in the windy conditions. Lovely morning on Friday for the sculling pod who went up to the Pink House and beyond. Well done to the Oxford women and grudging not a bad effort to the Cambridge Men.
So the Head Season is over, Easter off and we are quickly into the regatta season. Let's keep the momentum we have going and get good club representation at the local regattas in April, May, June and some pewterware, points and de novicing. The good news is that regatta races down require hours of marshalling and are over and done in 4-6 minutes. Racing starts and side by side racing is a great adrenalin rush. But to win pots you going to have to race a heat, semi final and final. So on land we'll be focus on shorter sharper erg sessions, on the water we'll be working on racing starts and short high rate pieces to get up to sprint speed.
To plan which regattas we want to enter and find out who wants to race we will have a squad meeting after the erg session on Thursday 7th April.
Here's a list of some of the local regattas and some more distant ones that we generally compete in:
Sun 24th April Hammersmith Regatta
Sat 30th April Chiswick Regatta
Sat 14th May Putney Town Regatta
Sat 28th May Twickenham Regatta
Sat/Sun 4/5th June Met @ Dorney
Sat 11th June Barnes & Mortlake International
Sat 18th Marlow @ Dorney
Sat 25th Richmond Regatta
Thursday 29th June - Saturday 2nd July Henley Royals
Fri/Sat 8/9th July Henley Masters
Sat/Sun 23/24th July St Neots
Sat 30th July Henley Town and Visitors
Sat/Sun 20/21 August City of Oxford
We will prioritise our regatta entry at the squad meeting.
This week:
Tuesday Erg: 30 mins feet out R20
Thursday Squad Erg 4 x 1 k @ r 26, 28, 30, 32, 4 mins rest
Weekend: Please get your availability up to date please, it looks pretty sparse at the moment.
Further Ahead:
Sculling Camp 15-17th April. First chance to master the dark arts of single sculling. Also we want to get people out of 8s and into smaller boats - 2-, 2x and getting experience of steering. It is important to increase the pool of signed off steers to maximise the outings we get on Tuesday and Thursday evenings. Sculling camp gives people an opportunity to bow steer in quieter conditions.
And everybody should read up on the Tideway Code in preparation for taking the steering test!!!
Have a good week, I'm not around this weekend but will catch up with everyone at the Squad Meeting
Jez
Cygnet Weekly News
23rd March 2016
Winter is officially over. Head of the River weekend marks the end of winter and beginning of spring and it certainly felt cold out there on Saturday. Well done to all 3 crews that competed over the two days and especially well done for the 5 guys (Scott, Piers, James, Vasil and Robert) rowing HoRR for the first time after joining the club and taking up rowing just 5 months ago. I hope everyone got a buzz from it and didn't mind the choppy water down the course. Bragging rights go to Marj and Dave's crew, I hope those out on Saturday for Cristobal's 4.0 were kind to the members of the losing crew. Results were:
Cygnet 1 - 21 mins 23 secs (280 overall)
Cygnet 2 - 22 mins 02 secs (308 overall)
Both crews put in very encouraging rows that gives promise for the regatta season if we keep working hard on and off the river.
On Sunday the Cygnet/TSS Mas F composite finished in 22 mins 39secs 161 out of 219 after many changes and late substitutions in the crew but the main thing is that the made the race!
Go check out the race faces:
Cygnet 1
Cygnet 2
Cygnet/TSS MasF
This week:
Thursday 7pm Squad recovery erg, 30 mins r20 feet out
Weekend
Not many of us around at the weekend and not enough to make up crews so it will be small boats for those who are signed off to steer. The river should be much quieter that of late so we could make up a sculling pod at 8 on Saturday and 9 on Sunday.
Further Ahead
Sculling Camp 15-17th April. Great opportunity to learn new skills. One on my aims for this summer is to get more people signed off to steer small boats. It makes organising crews over the summer much easier. It starts with learning to scull and gaining enough skill on sculling camp to be able to carry on under supervision back on the Tideway.
Even further ahead
Regatta season starts soon. That means side by side blade clashing action and lots of the thrills, spills and hopefully pots. In the next week I'll compile the list of regattas for us to target. In April, May and June we have a run of local Tideway regattas and we should aim to be represented at all of them. We will start training on the river on Tuesday and Thursday evenings after Sculling Camp and we will be spending more time in smaller boats rather than 8s. That requires steersmen to bow steer 4s and 2s, so that's why we need more people to pass their steering tests.
More of the summer plan in the next week or so.
Finally
A massive thanks to all those who helped in the run up to HoRR with coxing and coaching and on the day:
Alan, Marj, Sue, Robin, Matt and Claudia
Finally, Finally
Boat Race on Sunday, Women's race at 3:10 Men's at 4:10, come and cheer the Dark Blues to more wins.
Jez
Eric Wale
9th March 2016
Eric William Wale
30th April 1931 - 11th February 2016
Rowing often runs in families. It is not hard to think of some of the longstanding names in our sport - the Phelps and the Barrys come easily to mind. Still, such longevity remains the exception rather than the rule at Cygnet. That said, though, one family that can point to almost a century of association with Cygnet is the Wales.
Eric William Wale, who died on 11th February 2016, was the son of W.G. (Billy) Wale, who joined Cygnet at Hammersmith in the early 1920s and remained a keen supporter in the post-war period. Minutes of annual general meetings throughout the early 1950s record the presence of both father and son and some of Eric's surviving contemporaries still recall Wale senior as an enthusiastic cheer leader at regattas, sharing in their trials and triumphs.
Eric joined Cygnet in 1949, directly from National Service, having served in the RAF. Indeed, according to Frank Caughlin, a fellow crew member, Eric's first appearance at Cygnet was in his RAF uniform. However, Eric quickly made the transition to 'civvy' street, initially joining the Treasury Solicitor's Department, before moving to the Telephones Branch of the General Post Office (GPO), thus maintaining family tradition ('Billy' had also worked in the GPO as a postman). In later years, this branch of the GPO would be hived off as British Telecom (BT), where Eric would enjoy a highly successful career until retirement in the late-1980s.
In 1949, Eric would have been welcomed at Cygnet as one of a new wave of 'young blood' upon whom the club's hopes of reclaiming the victorious years of the 1930s would hang. Eric took an active interest in club affairs and soon found himself on the committee. By 1950, the club was in a position to boat an Vlll for open regattas consisting entirely of the post-war intake of new members. Thereafter, Cygnet continued to build up a competitive head of steam such that by 1953, in Eric's own words (penned in the 1990s), 'there was a real feeling that the breakthrough had been achieved'.
Eric was referring to a Junior Vllls win at Chiswick, Cygnet's first win in open competition since 1939. A photograph of the victorious crew drawn from Cygnet's digitized archives (available to view on the web site) shows Eric standing on the far right, the initials E.W.W. proudly emblazoned across his tracksuit top. Silverware aside, Eric also met Sylvia, his future wife, at Chiswick Regatta. By 1954, Cygnet was riding on a high and Eric rowed in winning Junior-Senior Vllls at Horseferry, Willesden and Kingston, followed by Maidenhead in 1955.
Every generation retains fond memories of their competitive (and less competitive) years at Cygnet. In Eric's case, we are fortunate that he chose to devote some of his retirement to authoring 'Cygnet Rowing Club: The Fifties'. This account, which proved invaluable in the compilation of a more recent history of the club, captures the spirit of the post-war era at Cygnet and justifiably concludes that 'the fifties were by any standard a period of significant achievement'.
Although Eric retired from active rowing in the fifties, he retained a keen interest in the club's activities for the rest of his days and regularly attended club social occasions. As club historian, I am particularly grateful for the club memorabilia that he periodically passed on to me in later years. Some of this memorabilia dated back to the time of Wale senior, like the 1922 Civil Service Regatta programe, which lists 'Billy' rowing three in Novice lVs.
One of Eric's regrets was that he never competed at Henley Royal Regatta, although 'the intention or aim was always there'. Nonetheless, he rarely missed an opportunity to attend Henley Royal, joining Vic Reeves and Frank Caughlin for an annual visit to the Stewards Enclosure. That said, Eric was happiest picnicking with family and friends out on the towpath close to the start of the regatta, comfortable in the knowledge (as he put it) that 'everybody does Henley in their own way'.
Eric is survived by his wife Sylvia and two daughters, Gill and Sarah. Among those who attended his funeral at Chilterns Crematorium, Amersham on 26th February were his rowing contemporaries Frank Caughlin, Maurice Hart and Brian Lovis, all of whom recalled carefree days sparring in club regattas on the Chiswick reach more than half a century ago.
Paul Rawkins
Club Historian
March 2016
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