Bedford Rowing Club
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Bedford Rowing Club Limited (company number 13170149) and Bedford Rowing Social Club Limited (company number 13173578), registered office address: The Boathouse, Duckmill Lane, Bedford, UK, MK42 0AX.
Bedford Rowing Club Impact Report for the Trustees of the Gale Family Charity Trust December 2023
The members of Bedford Rowing Club were extremely grateful to receive a grant of £2,000 from the Gale Family Charity Trust earlier in the summer. The grant is being used to support the coaching of the junior section of Bedford Rowing Club, which now has 29 fulltime athletes and a further 20, who are learning to row on Sunday afternoons. The 49 juniors predominantly come from seven local secondary schools in and around the borough of Bedford including The Free School, Mark Rutherford, Newnham, Sameul Whitbread, Ouse Valley, Kimberley College and Bedford 6th Form College. Our programme is proving so successful that we now have a long wai�ng list of juniors wan�ng to join the sport. Two athletes, who recently went through our programme (Ellie Cooke (le�) and George Reed (below)) were selected for the Great Britain Under 23 Team at the European Championships in the autumn. George narrowly missing out on the gold medal.
Since receiving the grant, we have had a number of notable successes, which included: Isaac Dean being selected from a field of 110 athletes for the GB U16 training camp. He put in the hours, committed to his training and achieved remarkable ergo scores and water times. The experience gave his coach insight into the working of the GB Junior squad training methods. It was also great exposure for Bedford Rowing Club, with many of the applicants he was up against coming from the private school sector. At the hotly contested National Schools Regatta, held at Eton Dorney, we took two scullers who competed in the Championship Single Sculls event and a Bedford/Star composite quad. Our aim for this event was to try and get in the top half of the C finals. Crews race off in the morning against the clock, based on their recorded times they are then placed in the semi-finals and eventually finals. All three crews surpassed expectations. The girls quad put in some very impressive races, one in particular with a snapped rudder cable, and managed to get into the B final. Jack had an exceptional event managing to win the B final of the single sculls. But the high light was Isaac having the row of his life in the Semifinals and making it into the A final of Championship singles (J18) when he had only just turned 16. This was an exceptional result and
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Bedford Rowing Club Limited (company number 13170149) and Bedford Rowing Social Club Limited (company number 13173578), registered office address: The Boathouse, Duckmill Lane, Bedford, UK, MK42 0AX.
Bedford Rowing Club put him on the national radar. He recently accepted a full sports scholarship to Shiplake College near Henley to continue his rowing career. We couldn’t be prouder of Isaac and wish him well in his future rowing career, which was forged at Bedford Rowing Club. -
At the British Rowing Championships in August all of our crews found the conditions at Strathclyde Park, Glasgow resembling the North Sea rather than the flat Ouse! The girls quad again excelled and placed 5th in the A final – a fabulous result.
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Many of our juniors raced throughout the summer at various regattas with varying degrees of success.
While the above are standout moments, the most important thing is we are able, through the support of charities like yourselves, to provide an environment where young people have been able to experience the positive advantages and life skills that rowing offers. Being part of a close-knit supportive community, with a real sense of comradery and purpose, has undeniable benefitted all of our juniors. The success of Ellie, George and Isaac has inevitably created role models for our juniors to lookup to and be inspired by. We go into this season with continued optimism. Our aim is to steadily improve fitness, strength and technical ability of all our young rowers. We have recently had a big intake of juniors from Star Club who have blended into the squad really well. We’re hoping that a couple of the J16 girls will achieve the standards required to apply for the GB rowing camp next Spring. We are also heading to Banyoles for a week’s training camp in April. This will be the first camp for many of them as this is our first trip since before covid. I hope that you can see your support is having a significant impact on the lives of our young juniors. Thank you for your support and there is of course an open invite, should you so wish, to join us at the Rowing Club to see at first hand our programme in ac�on.
Hugh Maltby President, Bedford Rowing Club
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Bedford Rowing Club Limited (company number 13170149) and Bedford Rowing Social Club Limited (company number 13173578), registered office address: The Boathouse, Duckmill Lane, Bedford, UK, MK42 0AX.
Bedford Rowing Club
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Bedford Rowing Club Limited (company number 13170149) and Bedford Rowing Social Club Limited (company number 13173578), registered office address: The Boathouse, Duckmill Lane, Bedford, UK, MK42 0AX.