Double medal success for Rebecca

Editorial Department • Published 26 Aug 2010 16:00 0 Comments

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Rebecca Humphreys (right).

ROWING - European Universities Rowing Championships

Local Enniskillen rower, 21-year old Rebecca Humphreys, now based in London, won two silver medals at the weekend representing Great Britain at the European Universities Rowing Championships in Amsterdam. This follows on from her silver medal success in the Quadruple Scull at last year’s Championships in Poland.

Rebecca’s rowing progress over the past two years has been blighted by both serious injury and then by glandular fever, but she now appears to have put these behind her in her quest to progress in British rowing at international level.

She represented GB Universities with Helen Ralston in a highly-fancied lightweight double scull pairing. She was also in the GB lightweight women’s quad, along with Helen Ralston, Sarah Murphy and Orla Hayes.

Having progressed through the heats in both events, Rebecca raced in both Finals, narrowly pipped by a strong German crew in the Quadruple scull, and by a Polish crew in the Double scull. This was particularly a most commendable performance, as this Polish crew are also the current World University Champions and will be representing Poland at the next Senior World Championships.

Results

LW4+

1st Germany - 7.06:95 (event record time, beating previous record of 7.07:12 recorded by Poland in the Zagreb Championships 2008)

2nd Great Britain - 7.09:09 (Orla Hayes, Sarah Murphy, Rebecca Humphreys, Helen Ralston)

LW2+

1st Poland - 7.24:82

2nd Great Britain - 7.28:06 (Rebecca Humphreys, Helen Ralston)

Immediately prior to going to Amsterdam for these Championships, Rebecca had spent two weeks with her University of London colleagues in China at the World Elite University Rowing Challenge. This very high profile event featured the University crews of London, Oxford, Cambridge, Harvard, Yale, Otago (NZ), as well as three top Chinese crews. Although this was an elite Mens 8 event, Rebecca attended to fulfill her responsibilities as Club Captain which included media interviews for the local and national Chinese press, radio and television! The main competition was held at the Beijing Olympic lake Yea, and the club then competed in another event in Changdu. The trip itinerary also included some time off from competition with visits to the Great Wall, the Forbidden City, as well as the Olympic Stadium & Olympic village in Beijing.

The back end of the year will once again see Rebecca commence the process of GB full and under-23 squad trials. The previous two years have seen her withdraw from these at advanced stages following injury and illness, so she is looking forward to making a healthy and successful attempt at making the GB team as things start to shape up for London 2012!

This article appeared in Impartial Reporter 26 Aug 10

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