Rangiora girls give no quarter in quarterfinals

The girls from Rangiora just can’t hold back, not for their coach and certainly not for spiders.

Rangiora High rowers Alice Pallister and Rose McEwan have made it through to the U18 girls double sculls after winning their quarterfinal race this morning.

Their coach Armin Svoboda had told them to hold back a bit, not to sprint to the end, to just qualify.

“We didn’t really listen to him [this time]. We wanted to beat Otago, they’re our main competition,” Pallister said.

Otago Girls’ High School’s crew has been rowing against the girls all season. Their skill and speed has “stuck out” for the girls, making them the yardstick the girls measure themselves against.

Besides, McEwan added, the first four crews were getting pretty close and the girls didn’t want them to catch up.

“We didn’t want to give them any hope for the finals,” said Pallister.

But their coach’s regatta strategy wasn’t the only thing that might have made them slow up.

As they got into their scull they noticed they were not alone in the boat.

A nest of spiders had made the boat a home.

Cobwebs and spiders got everywhere, on their caps, in their hair, in their eyelashes.

As the scull was held at the dock the girls tried to give their unexpected passengers the boot.

McEwan figured she plucked at least 10 spiders from Pallister’s head.

“I don’t know how they got in [the boat]. It was horrible, I hate spiders,” McEwan said.

Pallister was less squeamish, executing the stowaways like an old-time captain under maritime law.

“Rose was like ‘Alice, there’s another one. Squish it for me,” Pallister said.

The bug hunt continued as they coasted into position at the starting line, but once the race started nothing else mattered.

“I just didn’t think about the spiders during the race,” McEwan said.

“Yeah, they were really annoying before the race though,” said Pallister.

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