Surprisingly there was a somewhat luke-warm interest in participating in the Xpress Head on June 4th 2022. The clash with The Queen's Platinum Jubilee and the long weekend no doubt contributed, leaving only four of us with nothing better to do than race on the Saturday. We were myself (Anne Roberts) and Lorraine as the two old timers, Shonu who signs up for everything, and Marija who is the proud owner of her own erg which she also uses. Fortunately for us, Meg had just returned bronzed and relaxed from her holiday in Greece and agreed to cox.

So after no practice outings we headed off in Spare Rib to the race start. Lorraine in her usual seat as stroke followed by Shonu, Marija and me – a scratch line up from W1, W2 and W3. As I was coxing my Cantabs Masters G boat of retirees in the next division we had asked to be sent off in good time and not at the back of the pack which is frequently the case for a coxed IV. Somewhat to our surprised we were drawn as boat 1 with the dizzying prospect of being chased by Clare M1. We wondered how much head start Claire would give us. The rumour was 4 minutes. Lorraine muttered, ‘Hope we get around Ditton before they catch us up.’ It was a real treat to arrive at the start of a race and go off first and not have the usual wait. We did a rolling start and were off. Meg steered an excellent line around all the corners and especially snug on Grassy and the we kept up a rating of about 30 which felt long and solid. To our delight we were halfway up The Reach before Clare came around Ditton. We had a brief moment of thinking we might get to the finish line before them. However, Clare put on a tremendous push and overtook as at the railway bridge. Their push had lifted us on to finish in good style and a very respectable time of 11.05 over a course of about 2.1 km. With our masters adjustment we came in with 10.26 and somewhat unexpectedly came top of our category of Open Miscellaneous 4+ and a first Chesterton win for Shonu and Marija. Big smiles all round.

To complete a very enjoyable day I then won my first coxing medal with my Cantabs Masters G Harlequins crew in the next division.