Chapter ?: In which lots happens

Soooo, it's been a while! Apologies for the lack of updates, what with Colours, the Anna Liffey Dinner, Uni Champs and the start of the regatta season we've been a little busy. Now, mostly in the form of pretty pictures, we'll try to fill you in with the news from the world of pink and black over the last few months....

Are you sitting comfortably? Then we shall begin...

Colours:

That inconsequential (haha) little set of races against UCD (gggrrrrr!) was this year held on St Patrick's bank holiday Monday, 19th April. The week beforehand the whole of Ireland got an insight into Colours rowing and Trinity Boathouse with a feature in the Irish Times STYLE magazine (rowers... style magazine... ???), the 'casual capsize' wet-look hair styles were interesting but Captain Rebecca Dowling and Vice Captain Rebecca Deasy both looked stunning for the cameras. The artistic messy pile of riggers on the other hand...

When race day arrived the Seniors in the Corcoran Cup raced hard and well but were bested by UCD; whilst disappointed with the result the crew were pleased with their performance and certain that it still promises greater things to come later in the season.

Heartache

The Novices on the other hand decided to play it cool: tantalised UCD with several changes of the lead in the Sally Moorhead race, nearly gave their supporters multiple heart attacks, and switched it on, stepped up and stormed home to win by a convincing margin in the last few hundred meters of the race! Epic.

Nice.

Congratulations to the girls who really did do a fantastic job to reclaim the Sally Moorhead for the first time in three years and in doing so prevent UCD from taking a second consecutive clean sweep. 

The winning Novice crew with the Sally Moorhead Trophy. Coach Phil Keane, Amy Nash (Str.), Nicola Davies (7), Tara Hamilton (6), Rebecca Sanfey (5), Lucy O'Donoghue (4), Deirbhile Tuite (3), Cathy Prendergast (2), Rachel Botha (Bow) and Grace Gannon (Cox).

Dublin Head

After Colours, very soon after Colours(!), came Dublin Head in which our Novice and Intermediate crews got a chance to do a bit more racing on the Liffey. The Inters stole the show as fastest women's crew of the day and got a really really big pennant for their troubles.

Ann Liffey Dinner

The day of Dublin Head was finished off perfectly with the return of our annual Anna Liffey alumni dinner to it's spiritual home in the Trinity Boathouse. Whilst a delay in being able to confirm the date meant the turn out was perhaps not as big as we would have liked, the event was none the less a great success with everyone agreeing that the company and food were equally excellent. 

It was nice to see a few of the new DULBC blazers in action, and we were delighted to present His Excellence the Coleman with one too as a small token of our gratitude for the heroic work his has done for our club over the past 5 or more years. 

Think he likes it!

Those who were brave enough finished the night off by heading into town to D2 for the infamous 'Girls on the Pull' Dublin Head night out... wasn't just the girls though...

Trinity Regatta

Regatta dresses, racing and this year actually some Pimms! One of the largest entries Trinity Regatta has seen in years (even if it was mostly J15 1xs) meant 12 hours of racing from 7am to 7pm and included wins for DULBC in the Novice 4+ (well done 1st Years!), Inter 4+ and Inter 1x. No one came out to play at Senior level so unfortunately they had to spend the day on the bank.... ah well! 

University Championships and Skibbereen Regatta

Then we all went to Cork. And won stuff. It was great. Novice 8+, Intermediate 8+, Senior 2x, Bank of Ireland and OVERALL UNIVERSITY CHAMPIONS (again!). Trinners really is for winners. On Sunday followed up with Novice 8+, Novice 4+ at Skibb Regatta and a great party back in Neptune. 

Taking home the Bank of Ireland... 

Neptune Regatta (aka. the Trinity Ball after party)

So then a brave few members of DULBC, having experienced this the night before...

... went on to WIN the Novice 8+ at Neptune Regatta the next day. Good work girls, the 'carb loading' (1am trip to the kebab van) clearly worked! 

AGM

Last but by no means least, for now, we gathered for our AGM on the evening of Thursday 26th April. Reports from the Captain, Treasurer and Secretary painted a picture of a thriving, happy and successful club to the assembled members. We have a bit of fund raising left to do this season to cover the balance of the new Swift 8+ that is soon (hopefully!) to be arriving to provide our Novice and Intermediate crews with a suitable quality racing boat, but with a bit of effort and enthusiasm we'll get there by the end of the year. We unanimously voted to introduce a brief description of the design and criteria for the DULBC blazers into the constitution and then ultimately got on to the most important business of the night: electing 2012/13's Captain. After excellent and impassioned speeches from four nominees the members were left with a difficult decision - a testament to the commitment and capabilities of so many members of our club - ultimately voting Hazel O'Neill in as our Captain Elect for the coming season. We all wish her the best of luck in putting together her committee over the coming months and leading us to many more victories in the future. 

The end. For now.