RegattaCentral

News Friday July 28th

I'm sorry to say the heat sheets/land draw will not be up until Sunday night.   Family obligations have me out of town all most of the weekend.  Check back on Sunday and we will have it all up for you.   Maps of the course and the venue will be going up soon, as well as a waiver form.   More info about lodging is up on the lodging section of this site.

News July 27th
With 24 hrs to get entries in, things look great.  We already have one event that will go to 2 flights  (boys novice 1x).   Please remember to send me an email with a quickie description of each of your entries (ie "two pretty big gonna be 9th graders with a year of sweep experience and in their first summer of sculling" or "A 95 lb 5th grader, in his first 6 weeks of rowing/sculling")   This is critical information for making fun, reasonable, and competitive flights.  The next event likely to go to flights will be the Boys Nov 2x.

I would also like to clarify our definition of "Novice".    Novices will be those who began training for competition as scullers or sweep rowers in or after the Fall of '05.   This means that novices have to be in their first calendar year of rowing competitively.   A rec rowing program last summer does not mean that a kid is not a novice, but rowing on a mod team or a sweep team prior to fall of '05 does mean that a kid is no longer a novice.  One option we have for breaking the novice boy 1x's and potentially the 2x's (if they get big enough) into flights is to create a "super novice" flight made up of rowers who started either this summer or this spring....this would be a lot of fun to watch...but it can only happen if you all communicate with me about your rowers.  The heat sheet will be up on Sat morning provided we have the info needed to make flights.

Late entries:   We will not re-tool the flights or events on behalf of late entries.   Late entries will be accepted on a space available basis.   Fees for late entries will be the same as on time entries for crews who entered on time and are adding events after the deadline.   There will be a one shot late entry fee of $40 for crews who wish to enter late and have completely missed the deadline.

Min entries:  Any event with 2 or more entries will be raced (two boats makes a race).  Currently there is one event with a single entry (Flyweight, 90#, girls 2x).   Crews in events on their own that are going to be cut, have the option of moving to another event or getting a refund.

NEWS July 25th    We have added a girls flyweight 2x as well.  Girls will need to be 90lbs or less.   Coaches are on their honor, there will be no weigh-ins at this year's regatta.

NEWS  July 22nd:   Distances are set:  Team boats (2x and 4x) will race 1500m, singles will race 1000m.   We have added a flyweight boys 2x (under 100lbs) and keep checking the heat sheet for more events as folks speak up and the entries start coming in.  Please remember to send Matt Hopkins an email with requests for more events and a narrative description of each of your entries so that we can either use that info to create new events or place your crew in a flight that is their speed.

NEWS FLASH!!!   Feed back from coaches has been clear:  there is big reservation out there about racing 2K.   As such we will cut the course to 1500m.   Some even suggested 1000m.   If you have not chimed in on this subject let us know what you think.   One thought would be to race the 1x's at 1K and the team boats at 1,500m.   Unless we get more feed back presume 1,500m rather than 1000m, we will not race 2K.

Schedule Notes:  The schedule as posted on Regattacentral is tentative.  We are committed to a finals only format to allow athletes to race both a singles event and a team event (2x or 4x) with out racing more than two 2000m pieces in one day.   If an event goes to more than 8 entries (we have 8 lanes), we will split it into 2 or more finals.  Splitting could happen by age, experience, weight, or speed if there are multiple entries from a single team or if an event gets large enough to split.   Please take time to send us a an email when you are done with your entires with a little narrative for each boat, so that we can split events properly (ie  "Our nov boys 2x are big guys but they started rowing two weeks ago", or "This quad is literally a boat load of 80 pounders, lots of fight, but not much dog" )  Please be sure that your contact information for this regatta is updated with someone who will be able to answer questions about the experience or speed of your crews, we want our splitting to create meaningful races and not lopsided blow outs.

Currently the flow of the schedule will permit coaches to boat all the early events and then get out and watch the races.  There will then be a break followed by the afternoon races with the same flow.   This plan accommodates both the re-rowing that we expect between the morning and the afternoon and the nature of our course.   We have a great straight shot course that is well protected and has good spectating....but it is not in front of our boathouse/launch site.  So coaches, you will launch your crews and then hoof it or hop on a bike to the finish line to watch race.    It is a bit like racing at Cooper, where you don't have much of a clue what is happening on the course from the launch site.   

Awards:   Awards will be handed out on the awards dock, at the finish line right after each race.  This dock is also available for hot seating, but not for launching and landing.  We will have medals for 1st, 2nd, and 3rd for each event.

Housing:   We expect most crews to drive in on race day, but if you are planning an over night please contact Matt Hopkins for help with finding housing.  (518) 378-3938.

Hot seating:   The schedule as it stands is hostile to hotseating with a group of events (Morning or Afternoon) but very friendly to hot seating between the two groups of events (Morning to the Afternoon).  If you find that the schedule is limiting the number of kids you can race send us an email and we will do what we can to find you loaner equipment.