St Peter’s reaching for rowing stars
St Peter’s School rowers are training seven day a week, often before the sun rises, as they bid to finish top school overall at Aon Maadi Cup.
It’s six-thirty in the morning, the sun is still rising and fog is slowly lifting from Lake Karapiro.
St Peter’s School rowers are already on the lake.
The Aon Maadi Cup regatta is only two weeks away, and the seniors are currently training 7-8 times a week – they don’t have time to wait for the sun.
“We train around eight times a week, every week for around two hours each session,” said rower Reuben Van Dalen.
Sundays are their only day off, unless there is a competition on.
Janey Wackrow has been director of rowing at St Peter’s for 12 seasons, and is hoping her 57 strong team will take out the Star Trophy at the Maadi regatta, to be held at Lake Karapiro at the end of March.
The star trophy is given to the school which has gained the most points overall.
“If we win that overall schools title, it shows the strength and depth of our team, so it’s a bit more of a reward for everybody,” said Wackrow.
Over 10% of the school is involved in rowing, and their Aon Maadi Cup team involves the top performing rowers: 12 boys and 45 girls.
“Rowing is one of those sports that does physically challenge people so it does build into the school’s ethos of being built on a rock,” said Wackrow.
Location is a vital part of their rowing lifestyle. Being in Cambridge, they are only 20 minutes from Karapiro, where professional rowers also train.
“Cambridge is a bit of a hub of high performance.”
Their location also will mean an advantage at the Aon Maadi Cup, because with the rowers training on the lake most days they know where the wind will come from and other distractions.
“They’ve got that instinctive knowledge of the course,’ said Wackrow.
St Peter’s also hope to hang onto the sculling trophy, which they have won for the past few years.
Wackrow holds high hopes for the under 17 girls team, who have won every race this season in their quad.
Sydney Johnson is one of the top rowers at St Peter’s, and is hoping to achieve top five in all her boats, which includes U18 girls single, U18 girls double, and U18 girls quad.
“My main competition is really everyone who medalled in the South and North island regattas last week. However, you have to be ready for anyone and anything so I try to focus on what I can control, which is my own boat and my own race,” said Johnson.
St Peter’s did well in the Aon North Island Secondary School championships, placing in the top three in 21 of their 53 races, which included eight first places.
The team have generally got better results when they have travelled, Wackrow attributes it to being able to stay together and bond during the time.
To make up for this, the team are heading to Whakamaru for a camp this weekend, where they will spend all day Saturday and half of Sunday rowing.
“This gives us a chance to stay together as a team and just get everyone mentally prepared,” says Wackrow.
“They go through a lot of tears and trainings and hard work and ups and downs together.”
There are still some nerves from Wackrow, who hopes the rowers will be able to pull off their best race of the season.
“As a coach it’s the unknown, we don’t have any control once we push them off the pontoon. It’s up to them to get themselves to the start and race down.”
Wackrow attributes a lot of their rowing success to the parents.
“We wouldn’t be able to do it without the parents; they play a huge role in keeping the programme ticking over. We need their help to function.”
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