Cover image by Mark Kelly (thewateredge)
The club eight event at the Irish University Championships is a valuable progression for previous season novices and younger rowers to step towards intermediate and senior eights. With only three entries at this year’s renewal, the club eight will be run as a straight final on Friday, but plenty of these athletes will be doubling or even tripling up in other events throughout the day. Let’s have a look at the three podium contenders.
UCD
The holders of this category at the Irish Championships last year, the saffron and blue will look to retain that title again in July but first set their sights on the university championship. This crew contains both winners of the club eight and novice eight last year, so expect a wealth of experience from bow to stroke. Jessica Farrell and Emma O’Neill were a part of that winning club crew and, this time, sit in the engine room of this crew. They will be supported by novice eight champions Phoebe Grimes, Genevive Dowling and Orla O’Sullivan, who look to step up against more experienced opposition. Both O’Sullivan and Farrell, alongside stroke Kerry Hendrick, recently saw success at the Colours Boat Race, where they defeated Trinity College Dublin in the reserve coxed four.
Trinity College Dublin
Having lost the Colours Boat Race to UCD, Trinity will be hoping for better luck in this event. To enable success, they will call upon previous winners from 2023, such as Julia Dunne and Eliza Barret-Cotter, who have been part of Trinity’s successful programme, winning both novice quad and eight at the Irish Championships two years ago. Joining them are several members of last season’s novice eight crew who finished behind UCD. Roisin Cormican, Anna Ryan and Charlotte Connolly will be hungry to take revenge on several of the UCD crew who won the novice title last year.
UL
Rounding off the field, this UL crew contains several experienced junior rowers and two coastal athletes. The most experienced in the boat is senior eight champion Miriam Fleming who will look to pass on her winning mindset and experience to the rest of her crew. Katelyn Kehoe and Leah Gallagher bring their coastal rowing experience to the boat and will hope to transfer their skills to flatwater racing. At stroke, Claire Tanner makes her transition from sculling during her time at Shannon RC, where she became Irish champion in the junior women’s quad in 2023, to sweeping at university level. Another successful junior in the crew is Elisa McInerney, who secured a bronze medal in the junior eights both in 2018 and 2019.
Prediction
Considering their continued dominance in the 8s category, UCD are firm favourites, but there is no doubt that Trinity College Dublin will not make it easy. UL also brings experience to the table in winning eights races, but the fierce rivalry between the two Dublin universities, especially after the Colours Boat Race, could see them make this final a two-horse tie
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