The Carleton Ravens rowing team took to the Rideau Canal Sept. 23 for their first big regatta of the season, battling rough winds and stiff regional competition.
Run by the Ottawa Rowing Club, the Head of the Rideau regatta is unlike other varsity sports tournaments in that it is not a university-only competition. In addition to the varsity portions of the event, there are novice, junior, and masters divisions.
There are many different races at the regatta including singles, doubles, fours, and eights, for both women and men. The club further subdivides some of these events into lightweight and regular categories. Overall, 40 Carleton rowing athletes competed in 12 events.
In total, there were seven universities competing, including Clarkson University from New York.
While having the first event of the season in their own backyard may have been an advantage for the team, the cold weather and heavy winds posed a big challenge.
Before the event, Ravens head coach Ed Fournier was optimistic about the team’s chances.
“I think we’ll do well,” he said. “It’s hard to know. Some of the other schools are pretty strong and we have some strong athletes as well, so we’ll know after the races how we’re doing.”
Fournier also said that this event should act like a stepping stone for the team.
“It’s more of a training day. We haven’t done anything special to prepare for this, we’ll start doing that more later in the season.”
Sara McGuigan, a second-year rower, competed in the lightweight women’s doubles event.
“We really don’t know how we’re going to do today,” McGuigan said. “We haven’t seen any of our competition yet, but we are hoping to do really well.”
At the end of the competition, the Ravens hopes became realities. Even though they did not have any first-place finishes, they competed extremely hard and did very well, especially for it being the first event.
“No firsts this time around, but this was our first regatta of the season so we have lots of time to improve,” McGuigan said, following her third-place finish with partner Ashley Broadhurst.
Other results for the Ravens include a third-place finish by Matthew Fournier and Bernard Charles-Li, a second-place finish by Fournier in the lightweight men’s single, as well as a second-place finish by Victoria Ozimkowski in the lightweight women’s single event.
McGuigan said the battle against the elements was just as tough as the battle between the boats.
“Well the cold is obviously unpleasant,” she said, “but we do our best to prepare for it. The wind is really rough because it affects conditions on the water that can make steering difficult as well as create more resistance in pulling our oars through the water.”
The next test for the Carleton Ravens rowing team is the Head of the Trent regatta in Peterborough Sept. 29.
