Nearly 30 UCD athletes competed at London Met, testing various combinations and getting good racing over the weekend.Saturday saw a Senior 4-, Senior 4+, Intermediate 8+ and Novice 8+ take to the water, as well as Andrew Goff and Shane O’Connell in a composite 4x.
The 4- raced Tier 2, also winning their heat well. In the final a very strong Leander crew took command of the race with NUIG and UCD competing for 2nd place down the course ahead of the other crews. NUIG finished strongly, having 2 lengths on UCD by the end.
The 4+ was at Championship level and the relatively new combination was in the mix at 1000m but fell back in the 2nd half, finishing 6th.
The Intermediate 8+ competed at Tier 3, winning their heat well but coming up against an Agecroft crew in the final who pushed them into 2nd place by just under a length.
The Novice 8+ were 4th in their Tier 5 heat, just missing out on top 3 and progression to the final.
The 4x raced twice, winning Tier 2 and finishing 6th in Tier 1.
Sunday brought the Challenge Eights, with three UCD crews competing in the timetrial.
UCD A’s time saw them through to the A/B semifinals with UCD B in C/D and UCD C going directly to the I final.
UCD A had a good battle with NUIG in the semifinal but both crews missed out on top 3 so they met again in the B final, with Imperial taking the win, 1 second ahead of NUIG who were 0.4 seconds ahead of UCD.
UCD B narrowly missed out on the C final but raced well in the D final against Shrewsbury School, coming 2nd ahead of Curlew RC, City of Oxford, Trinity, Oxford Brookes and Bristol University.
The 4x again raced twice, finishing 2nd in Tier 2 and 3rd in Championship.
