Last Saturday saw Portora Boat Club set off for Dublin looking forward to test their speed after a long winter in the gym.

Head season saw much disruption with every race in Ireland being cancelled due to flooding and extreme weather. The club took its largest ever contingent of athletes to Dublin with 87 rowers taking to the water throughout the day. The Men’s J18 squad had a very successful day with convincing wins over Bann Rowing Club in both the eight and four events.

These crews included several U16 rowers who also completed in the J16 eight event and again recorded a victory against Bann by several lengths.

The newly formed boys J15 squad raced two eights with the A crew knocking out the B crew in the semi-final of their event. Confidence high from this win, the A crew went on to beat Neptune Rowing Club, Dublin, in the final.

The Women’s squad, keen to test their speed against senior opposition, raced in a senior women’s eight which was a crew of juniors plus GB trialist Holly Nixon who also won the Women’s Senior 1x event.

Unfortunately the senior clubs had one eye on the University Championships next weekend and did not enter so the girls ran out comfortable winners against University College Dublin Novices.

The J18 girls eight had two very comfortable heats before the closest race of the day in the final where they lost out to Bann RC by a quarter of a length. The J16 girls squad had no such problems however as they handily dispatched Galway RC in their final to win by four lengths. Portora had four girls J15 eights entered which was quite a sight as they all faced off against each other in the semi-finals after the B crew defeated Athlone in the first round. The more experienced A crew came away with the win but full credit to the other crews featuring many girls who had never raced before.

The club now heads to Skibbereen Regatta in Cork this coming weekend to test their speed on the same course that will host the Irish Championships later in the year.