CSRC Regatta - Final Draw Now UP

Final Draw

No more changes will be made to this draw. If you have any problems or issues with the draw please come and see us at race control first thing on the day.

We are looking forward to seeing everyone on Saturday!

CSRC Regatta

Almost there....... Our regatta is on Saturday and as usual we need a few things!

Friday compound clear up - Can folks come down from 5.30pm to help clear up the compound ready for trailers please. We need lots of muscle to move boats and we could also use help setting up inside the clubhouse.

Garden furniture - We desperately need outside tables and chairs for the tearoom, if you can lend us some it would be great. Can you please drop it down on Friday evening (Always a good idea to put your name on it somewhere)

Regatta Day - Set up starts about 7am. We need help setting up tents and co-ordinating parking etc. There is loads to do so there will be no training on the loch on Saturday morning before the regatta!

Strathclyde Park Regatta

Congratulations to everyone who competed at Strathclyde Park.Challenging conditions meant the racing was a real test and our crews did really well. Results will be up soon.

Regatta Programme

We are now selling advertising space in our programme for the regatta. Prices below are based on an A5 programme. Please email captain@castlesemplerc.co.uk for more information.

Newsletter

Her is the April edition or the CSRC Newsletter. Thanks to our Secretary Lisa who has co-ordinated and put together our new newsletter. We will be putting one together on a regular basis to keep club members up to date with news from down at the club. If you have any news or articles please email us and we will include them.

Maintenance Day - Sunday 15th April - 10am onwards

We are having a maintenance day to check over equipment and boats before the start of the racing season. Don’t worry if you can’t fix boats we have plenty to do. All hands will be gratefully put to work. You don’t need to bring anything but yourselves!

Please come along for a couple of hours and help get the club ready for another successful season!

Queens Diamond Jubilee - A message from our Secretary

Hello Everyone,

The club has been asked to participate in the Queen's Diamond Jubilee Pageant on the Thames. The crew will take the Whiteforeland to London for the weekend and row the Lord Lieutenant of Renfrewshire in the event, as a composite with Royal West of Scotland Amateur Boat Club.

From Castle Semple, we need 6 people to take part in the event - 2 rowers, 2 understudies and 2 support crew.

You will need to be available from Friday 1st June to Monday/Tuesday 4th and 5th June.

If you are interested in taking part, then please email me by the 1st April.

New minibus

We are very pleased to have taken ownership of a minibus. This will allow us to continue to go to regattas and head races in far away parts and help the environment by taking fewer vehicles. Thanks to Western Ferries for their kind donation to help us purchase it and NATS for all their help. Now we need a name.........

Big Thanks

Thanks to the Scottish Rowing Centre for the Stepper machine that they gave us. It is now installed in the clubhouse and ready for use.....If you are not sure how to use it have a word with Richard, he has lots of gruesome things you can do to improve your core while climbing up mountains on it :o)

Scottish indoor Champs

Well done to everyone who competed at the Scottish Indoor Championships. We had a really good turn out and some good results for the club. Full results are up on the Scottish Rowing website as a pdf file. Congratulations to Harry Rodgers (2nd), Laura McDonald (2nd), Caroline Parker (2nd), Lisa Little (1st) and the CSRC A team who were 3rd in the Womens team event. Thanks also to Lesley and Mel who were there all day organising and supporting everyone and also competing themselves. Same again next year?

Membership renewal

You will shortly be getting an email from our Membership Secretary but if you want to get a head start our Membership Renewal Form is now available for download. I would like to highlight a couple of important points. The fee for the racing licence should be paid separately to the membership fees and must be handed to John (or left in the envelope on the board in the club) with the licence application form. An up to date email address is very important as this is now the clubs preferred method of communication, can you all please ensure you put one on the membership form even if you think we know it. Thank you!

Coaching links

Ivar Campbell has been working on getting together some Coaching links. This is the start of a page where we can link to good sources of information that can help in the quest to get better at rowing! If you have any good links that could go up on this page please email them to me and I will add them to the page. Thanks to Ivar for getting this started.

Wednesday Circuits

Circuits will be running this week on Wednesday down at the clubhouse at 5pm for those of you who have over indulged over xmas. It costs 50p per person, please pay on the night.

2012 Events list & Racing Licences

The Scottish Rowing timetable for next year is now up. First up for most of us is the Indoor Rowing Champs on the 29th of January. You don't need a racing licence for the indoor champs but the SUBC 4's & small boats head on February the 11th is close behind so please get organised and get your racing licence application forms in to John McKinney as soon as possible as it takes at least 2 weeks to get them at this busy time of year. Licences this year cost £39 Adults, £28 Students, £21 Juniors and £8 for Cadets. Payment must accompany the form to John please.

Caption Competition

The caption competition has been a bit stalled of late so I have come up with an absolute beauty of a picture for you all this time, well William came up with it I just scanned it! Check out the picture and have a go, I may even come up with a reasonable prize for the funniest caption. You can find it here.

CSRC 40th Anniversary Ceilidh

Thanks to everyone who contributed to a fantastic 40th anniversary Ceilidh. Supported by the White Cart Ceilidh band the evening kicked off at 7.30pm on Saturday night and the McKillop Hall in Lochwinnoch was soon filled with the sound of over 100 people enjoying themselves. Thanks to the efforts of the organisers Mel, Jo and Lisa there was a great turn out of CSRC members, plenty of friends and family and fellow rowers from other clubs. Our special guests for the night were five of CSRC’s founder members Jim MacRitchie, John McKinney, Duncan Paterson, Owen McGhee and Dave Allen pictured below. Dave Allen even travelled up from Cheshire for the event. We were very happy to welcome them and to demonstrate our gratitude for their efforts four decades ago.

After the speeches celebrating our history came the annual prize giving. The worthy winners this year were:
Most improved junior female: Emma Brander, with special mentions for Chloe Lyth, Laura McDonald and Emma McDonald
Most improved junior male: Joint winners Gavin Horsburgh and Cameron Grant with special mention for Alex Afuakwah
Most improved novice female: Jenni Wagner
Most improved novice male: Campell Horsburgh
Andy Dunn award for outstanding greatest contribution to the club: William Holmes
Well done to all of them!

The food for the evening, cooked, baked and assembled by those members talented in the culinary art, disappeared very quickly in time honoured CSRC tradition, Sandra did a sterling job on the tea urn and Jo, supported by John Delaney, refused to leave her position at the bar even when tempted by the Orcadian Strip the Willow.

The raffle was bigger than ever before thanks to the generosity of the club members and most tables went home with something (although the compere Keith Robertson needed some persuasion to hand over the Christmas cake to the lucky winners – the McDonald family). Lorne Campbell used skill and accuracy to become the happy owner of a bottle of whisky in the bottle slide.

The star of the show was the anniversary cake lovingly crafted by Kirsteen Lyth using old photo’s in the clubs history book as source material. It must’ve been good as John McKinney was able to identify each character in the boat! The cake was much appreciated by the founder members and current club members alike.

Lots of great photos of the evening, including those shown here, were taken by Charlie (and Sarah) Sanders and can be found on Facebook.

Inverness 4's and Small boats head

Well done to Caitlin for winning the WJu18 1x and coming 2nd in the WJu18 2x at the Inverness 4's and small boats head at the weekend. Well done to Katie Rodgers as well for going all the way to Inverness competing in the WJu14 4x+ and still making it to training on Sunday! Congratulations ladies :o)

Hong Kong Champs- 5th/6th November

Allan Watt competed in the Hong Kong Champs on the 5th and 6th of November. Even though he was giving away about 20 years he still managed to come away with a Silver and a Bronze. Nice to hear he is keeping his training up ready to come back and compete for CSRC again!

AGM - Wednesday 30th November - Revised date

The clubs AGM is being held on Wednesday 30th of november at 7.30pm in the clubhouse. Please come along and hear what has been happening in 2011 and what the plans are for 2012. It will be good to see you and to hear your thoughts!

Head of the Charles - 22/23rd October

Andy Holmes was in the Harvard Heavyweight 8 competing in the Championship 8's at the Head of the Charles in Boston USA at the weekend. Andy and the rest of the Harvard crew won the championship eights race, winning for Harvard for the third time and first time since 1977 to start the new season with a bang. Click here for a link to lots of stories about the race and a pic of Andy on the day (wearing his CSRC one piece)

Caption Competition -

Fun night at juniors tonight (for most of us) as a result we have a new caption competition picture up :o) Have fun folks!!

Castle Semple Rowing Triathlon- Saturday 10th September.

Unfortunately due to a lack of entries this year's Castle Semple rowing Triathlon due to take place on Saturday has been cancelled. The organisers would like to take this opportunity to thank those who entered the event and volunteered to marshal.

CSRC Regatta Sunday 28th August - Results now up.

Despite a fairly terrible weather forecast the regatta ran (although at a reduced length) and we got through all of the races on time and managing to see some great racing. The course was changed to 500 metres as the 1000 metre mark was unrowable at the start of the day and it didn't get a lot better as the day went on.

The cold weather meant that the soup, bacon rolls and chilli in the tea room went down very well indeed. The atmosphere was a little less frantic than it has been in previous years as entries were down this being a rescheduled regatta but it was by no means less enjoyable. A really good atmosphere was felt by everyone who attended.

We would like to thank everyone who did attend. Some people came a long way to support us this year and we hope they had a really good day. Thanks also to the umpires who showed up in numbers, Graeme and Ivar who organised the land side of things, Bill who managed the water, Rachel who spent long hours martialling the start and Kirsteen and Richard who were magnificent in the Tea Room. I know all of them would like me to pass on their thanks to all of the people who showed up and put in long shifts and helped them on the day.

I would like to also offer my thanks to everyone who pitched in and helped to make this a really friendly and enjoyable club event. Fingers crossed for a bit of sun next year though!

Home International Regatta 2011 - On Saturday 23rd July, the annual Home International Regatta took place on the eight lane international 2000 metre rowing course near Hamilton. Junior and senior teams of both sexes from Scotland, England, Ireland and Wales raced in a variety of events with racing starting at 10.30am and continuing until 4pm.

Emma and Olivia on the podium with coach Duncan after receiving medals for their win in the Junior Women's 2x at the HIR. They were Scotland's only Junior Women winners. Emma had already raced for third place in the junior women's 1x.

Article and photo supplied by Duncan Walker

Castle Semple Pentathlon - Well done to the Senior CSRC team 'The old gits and the young one' who won the Castle Semple Pentathlon. The team was made up of Elizabeth (Run), Willie Holmes (Wind Surf), Campbell (Sail), Lesley/Martin (Row) and Graeme Bell (Kayak). Graeme was kindly donated to us from the Kayak club and was a definite asset to the team. It was a lot of fun and everyone who entered did really well. Congratulations to all the team.

Junior Sessions - Most of you should know! but Junior sessions have entered their summer break and are not on now until Sunday 31st July. It's time for the coaches to have a bit of a breather so they can come back in 2 weeks and be full of energy and new evil training ideas. Have a good holiday and see you at the end of July!

British Champs - Emma McD (WJu16 1x & WJu 2x), Laura McD (WJu14 1x) and Alex (OJu15 2x) are competing down at the British Championships in Nottingham this weekend. The official website has all the draw details. Good luck to all of them!

For tweets (and hopefully live results) over the weekend Follow them on Twitter!

GB U23 - Congratulations to Andy Holmes who won a bronze medal in the 8+ for GB at the 2011 World Rowing U23 Championships, Amsterdam which took place between July 20th and 24th. Also well done to Gavin Murty of Clydesdale who was been selected in the Lightweight double scull.

GB Rowing have a Facebook page for those of you who like to keep up to date with what's going on through Facebook..

HIR - This years HIR will be held on July 23rd at Strathclyde Park. We would like to offer our congratulations to Emma McDonald and Emma Brander for being selected to represent Scotland in their junior team. Emma McD is selected in the 1x and the 2x and Emma B has been selected to cox the OJu 8+. Claire Hiddleston has also been selected (rowing for GUBC) in the 4x.

For tweets on the day Follow us on Twitter!

EGM - Thanks to everyone who came to the EGM. I think we will all agree there was a lot of information to take in. Remember to email any concerns or questions to Martin, Marcello or Lesley. If you don't have their email addresses email the captain and I will pass them on. Huge thanks to Marcello, Martin, Lesley and Caroline for all their work in representing the club during this planning phase.

Henley Womens Regatta - Emma McDonald competed at the Henley Womens Regatta in the W Ju18 1x. She did really well and made it through to the final where she was unfortunately beaten but it was a fantastic acheivement to get so far.

Emma Brander was coxing for GRC's 8+. They got through to the final day but just missed out on a place in the final finishing 3rd overall in the Inter club 8+. Well done to them all.

Full Henley Womens Regatta results are here.

Grand Raffle - Huge thanks to Mel Brander who organised and ran the clubs Grand Raffle. It has been hard going since our regatta was cancelled but Mel kept the pressure up and we have raised around £900 for the club. Many thanks to all of those who donated prizes, we couldn't have run this without you. We also want to thank everyone who made the effort to sell the tickets to neighbours and friends and to the juniors who went around selling tickets during the weekend. A full list of the winners is now up on the regatta page.

Scottish Champs - Well done to everyone who competed at the Scottish Champs. We had a great weekend and some fabulous results for the club. I will be putting the results up on Racing/Results page as soon as I have worked them all out! If you row for another club and want your results up please drop me a line. Thanks.

EGM - All members are invited to an Extraordinary General Meeting on Thursday 23rd of June to discuss the plans for the clubhouse for details click here. Emails have been sent out to members whose addresses we have. If you have not received an email and should have please email the captain to get your name on the club email list.

Grand raffle tickets - All ticket stubs and unsold tickets must be returned to Mel by Saturday once you have sold as many as possible. We will be selling the tickets at the Gazebo at Strathclyde Park over the weekend, we really need all club members to help sell them to try and make up for the disappointment of having to cancel our regatta. Fundraisers like this are vital to the running of our club.

We will be holding the draw on Sunday afternoon so please have a last week push to sell as many as you can!

Scottish Champs - It's the Scottish Championships this weekend so there will be no Novice session on Saturday and no Junior sessions on Sunday. All of the boats and coaches and most of the rowers will be at Strathclyde Park, why don't you come and join us and get your rowing fix by cheering on your clubmates? The CSRC gazebo will be there all weekend!

Castle Semple Regatta 21st May-

Update - Unfortunately due to predicted high winds over the weekend we have had to take the decision to cancel our regatta. We intend to reschedule and try again in the late summer/early autumn and we hope you will all support us again then.

We are still running our raffle! Please help us sell the tickets (or buy some yourselves) .....check out the regatta page for details. Draw being held on June 12th.

It appears the forecast was correct. I don't fancy even driving the launch in this!

Semple Loch 11am Saturday 21st May

Many thanks to the people who worked so tirelessly to organise everything. A huge amount of work had gone into the organisation of this event and though we know the risk is always there it is hard for all involved to have to cancel at this late stage.

Andy Update - It's the end of Andy's first year at Harvard and it's been a good one. He has become an integral part of the Freshman Heavyweight crew which won at the Eastern Sprints this weekend. Well done Andy!

They have put up a highlights video showing the end of the Freshman Grand Final and we get to see Andy and his crew receive their medals.

Caption Competition - It's been quite a while since I have updated this but ..........................I have uploaded a new picture for the caption competition.

Since it's been so long I have wiped it clean and we can start from scratch. Some previous winners can be found here for inspiration. No need to register on the page just give it your best shot!

CSRC Regatta - It's getting close to our regatta and the list of things we need is getting longer......So can we please put out a plea for:

An outboard engine with about 5hp or more

Outside tables and chairs (to be brought down on the friday)

Rolls, sandwiches, drinks, cakes (to be brought on the day)

If you have any of the items or are planning on bringing food donations could you please get in touch so we know whats coming please. Thanks!

Clydesdale Regatta - It's Clydesdale regatta this Saturday and boat loading will be at 5pm for all those racing. Please come down and do your bit, we will be having a bit of a boathouse tidy during the boatloading so plenty for everyone to do.

The Novice session will be on as usual on Saturday from 10 till 12.

CSRC Grand Raffle - This year to celebrate our 40th anniversary and to help raise funds for the club we are holding a grand raffle at our regatta. Mel Brander is organising the prizes for this and is asking if all members could have a think about donating something. We have some fantastic prizes already, thank you if you have donated, but we are looking for a few more to make it really special. Please let Mel know or email captain@castlesemplerc.co.uk if you are able to donate anything.

Strathclyde Park Regatta - It was a great weekend at Strathclyde Park this weekend. Saturday the weather let us down a bit but Sunday made up for it and the wind was kind both days. Some brilliant racing over the two days and I will put up CSRC results very soon. Well done to everyone who went and competed and a big thank you to all of those who sat on the sidelines and cheered them on.

Club Spring Clean - Hi Guys, Due to such popular and busy rowers at CSRC we are not able to get a day to fit all for a pre regatta maintenance sort out this year, however I am sorting a spring cleaning day on Good Friday starting round 9am. Marigolds to the ready, Coffee and Cake will be provided for willing volunteers. All welcome.
Kirsteen Club Master

Emma update! - Emma McDonald has been on the GB pathway since last October. This involves monthly submissions of ergo scores. She missed the initial time trial in November and entered at J16 Trial Level in February in Boston. She easily won the J16 event out of 27 scullers and secured 16th place in the overall placings which included a further 55 in the J18 list.

On the strength of this result, Emma attended the GB Spring Trials in Nottingham which
were held over the first weekend in April. This event is by invitation only and 19 other
Junior Women scullers joined Emma for three days of being put through their paces by
high performance GB coaches, supported by Club Coaches. Emma was accompanied by
Duncan Walker who has been working closely with Emma as she ups her training regime.

Emma said that it was “a fantastic experience although it was probably the hardest thing
she has ever done”. The opportunity to train along side such a high standard of athlete
proved to be inspirational for Emma as well as being an extremely positive experience for
her. The GB Spring Trials have left her even more determined and more competitive now
that she has seen the level that she wants to be working at.

This weekend will be followed up on April 24th at Dorney Lake, Eton, where GB selectors
hold a small boats regatta and the scullers will be ranked over 2000m racing. After that
crews are selected for Munich and Ghent regattas. Further trials are held in June at
Dorney again where a final selection is made of crews for the World Champs, Coupe de la
Jeunesse and GB V France J16 match.

Emma is training six days a week with double sessions on Saturdays and Sundays and
this reflects Emma's aspirations, competitive nature, ambition and commitment. Her ability
for good time management is highlighted by the fact that she is also currently studying for
her Highers and still managing to practice playing piano. We all wish Emma the best of
luck.

It looks like we will have to get “Well Done Emma Stamp” made for Emma too!

Speedcoach - Can whoever has the clubs speedcoaches please return them to the lockbox in the kitchen. These speedcoaches are for the use of all club members, if you borrow one you must always return it immediately. Please do not leave these in your boat and do not remove it from the club without the permission of the captain.

Coxing Seminar - Coxing Seminar: There will be a seminar on coxing at the Scottish Rowing Centre on Saturday 16th April at 1.30pm. Further details are available here. Contact john.blair@scottish-rowing.org.uk if you will be attending. There is a £5 charge for this event.

WackySox - Jenni had CSRC socks designed by Wackysox – see picture below. If you would like a pair, please let her know which size(s) and how many per size. She needs a minimum order of 25 pairs per size in order to get them done. The following sizes are available – 2-6, 7-11 and 11-14.

Prices are approximately:

Jenni needs to find out who is interested to see if we can get an order in, so please put down exactly how many pairs you would like and in what sizes. Contact Jenni on jve.wagner@gmail.com if you have any questions and to put in your order. Thanks!

WHorr - Huge congratulations to the CSRC/GRC crew who took part in the Womens Tideway in London at the weekend. Wearing number 277 they had a great race and finished the 7km course in a time of 22:56:12 finishing 249th out of 303 boats.

Congatulations also go to Emma Brander who coxed the Glasgow RC A boat to 86th place (20:56:59), Caitlin Horsburgh, Clydesdale ARC B 188th place (22:04:26) and Claire Hiddleston who stroked the Glasgow University B boat to 120th place (21:20:00)

It's great that so many of our members took part in this amazing event and had such a fantastic time. Thanks also to Kirsteen for going down with them and taking some wonderful photo's (including the one above). Kirsteens photo's can be found on her Facebook page!

Capsize Drill - It's that time again! This years capsize drill is on March 27th (sorry for the late notice) at Garnock pool at 5pm. It's really important that the juniors go and take part (unless they like wearing a life jacket while rowing) and all novices/New starts should do it as well if they have not done it before. You will need to take light clothes to swim in and there is a small charge to be collected at the pool.

News - If anyone has any club related news or information to go up on the website please email news@castlesemplerc.co.uk

Desperately seeking - Richard Lyth is looking for a new doubles partner who is up to the challenge of the 'Boston' Liam is unable to commit the time to train for the marathon this year so Richard is looking for a man who can! If you fancy giving it a go please talk to Richard down at the club or email me and I will put you in touch.

Strathclyde Regatta - The Strathclyde regatta info is now available. Entries need to be with Karen by March 30th so don't delay. Make sure you organise your cox early if you need one.

Reminder for everyone wanting to race at Strathclyde Park - Club kit MUST be worn by all competitors. If you don't have any now is the time to order it. Godfrey are our club kit supplier and can deliver small orders pretty quickly. Only one pieces and splashtops have any significant savings in bulk orders so if you need kit other than these probably best to order it yourselves. If you want a one piece/splashtop drop me an email and if there are a few of you I will do a club order.

CSRC Regatta - We have started having meetings to organise our regatta this year. It was great to see so many people at the first regatta committee meeting and the signs are good that this years regatta will again be a fantastic representation of our club.

This year the regatta is on May 21st so please try and keep the day free so you can come and be part of CSRC's big day. This year is a special year for the club as it was discovered that the first CSRC regatta was held in 1971, so this is our 40th anniversary! If you have any ideas how we can make it special or would like to be part of organising the event, please contact the regatta committee to find out how.

Results - Emma McDonald has won the WJu16 1x in Boston at the GB Junior trials, she is placed 16th overall which is a terrific achievement. Congratulations to Emma from everyone and good luck in the 2x.

Martin and Pete made the trek up to Inverness this weekend and had a successful day. They placed 5th in Division 1 and then took 10 seconds off their own time to come 3rd in Division 2 where they won the MOp 2x. They managed to complete both of their rows only being beaten by eights! There really is still life in the old dogs.....(Birthday coming up Pete?)

Publicity Officer - The club has been incredibly successful in many areas in the last few years and we would love to let the wider world know about some of our successes. With this in mind we are looking for someone to look after the publicity of the club. Anyone who is interested or has any experience in this area please contact captain@castlesemplerc.co.uk for more information.

SUBC Head - Unfortunately due to the height of the river and the amount of debris in it after the weeks rain the SUBC head race is cancelled. They are looking to reschedule in March.

Note: The SUBC Head has been rescheduled for March 12th. Please let Karen know if you would like to enter.

Great Western Eights Head - We had two crews competing at the GUBC head at the weekend. The Mens Novice 8+ were first off in the morning in perfect conditions. It was cold but sunny with very little wind. They coped with the unfamiliar (bendy) course really well and enjoyed being back on water. The ladies raced in the afternoon (thanks to the very determined Jenni) The crew was a mix of experience with juniors and novices competing in the first Womens Novice 8+ for a number of years. They did really well and everyone came back with a smile on their face, I think they may even do it again!

Update - The men finished the course in 22:50 and the ladies did it in 26:03. Well done everyone!

Scottish Indoor Champs - Well done to everyone who competed at the Scottish Indoor Championships on the 23rd of January. There were some great results for the club (and for old members). Silver medals went to Andrew Taylor, Laura McDonald and Alex Afuakwah. Lorne Campbell (rowing for Clydesdale) got a Bronze in the U18 Hwt, Finn Campbell (Clydesdale) a bronze in the U16 and Kirsty Sanders won a bronze medal in the womens lwt uni race but huge Congratulations to Emma McDonald for her Gold Medal in the U16 race. By all accounts it was a very convincing win and just deserts for all of the effort she has been putting in over the last few years.

Club Sessions - The loch is getting back to normal and some lucky members have made it out onto the water this week, however low overnight temperatures mean that we have to look at the conditions on a day to day basis just now. Fingers crossed for some cloudy nights! Where possible sessions will be out on the water this weekend but be prepared to ergo just in case.

At the recent Scottish Rowing Conference the Scottish Rowing Awards were announced and Andy recieved the award for Oarsman of the year! I know everyone will join me in congratulating him on this great achievement. Well done Andy!

Membership subs - A new year is upon us once more and so it’s time to remind you that subscriptions are now due. You should have recieved an email from our membership secretary John McKinney over the last few days, if you have not please email me so we can make sure you are on our members email list. The membership renewal form is also available here. Please get your forms in as soon as possible and don't forget to fill in your racing licence form too! Thanks.

Racing Licences - It's time to get your racing licences for the new year. If you are going to enter for any of the head races in the next couple of months you need to fill in a racing licence application form and get it back to John McKinney as soon as possible. The deadline for licences to be done for the Western Eights Head is the 3rd of January (Monday)!! Please note that racing licence costs in 2011 are Seniors £38, Students £27, Juniors £20 and Cadet £8.

Club Ceilidh - The clubs annual ceilidh was on Saturday November 27th at the McKillop Institute in Lochwinnoch.

Well done to everyone who made it to the ceilidh despite some pretty awful conditions. We had a great time.The band were really good and the juniors, as always, kept the dance floor full despite the fairly small turnout. Janice did us proud again with the buffet and my bar was impressive in it's choice (thanks Mel!). The juniors had their own 'bar' this year, many thanks to Sam and Craig (and Jeff) for staffing it.

Bill Hiddleston won the whisky in the pound shove with the last shot just beating Caroline out of the honours, Louise Hiddleston won the junior version of the event. The Hiddlestons dominance continued in the raffle.The raffle was a highlight with many prizes on offer, the cake made by Kirsteen attracted a lot of interest, Keith spent a long time after winning the cake convincing us all it could only travel if uncut! Thanks to everyone who donated prizes

One of the main parts of the evening is the awarding of the annual prizes for performance and contribution to the club. The well deserving winners were:

The Andy Dunn Trophy is awarded to a member who has made an outstanding contribution to the club. Leslie has stepped up over the previous 12 months and filled many essential but vacant posts within the club. Among her many hats she has been the Treasurer, Child Protection Officer, Junior Coach, Boat Trailer Driver, Secretary, Fundraiser and many more. Without people like Lesley the club simply couldn't keep going. She is a worthy winner this year, Congratulations!

Club AGM - The clubs AGM was on the 17th November.

Many thanks to the members who attended. Minutes will be posted on the forum as soon as possible. The committee has seen a few changes and the posts are now as follows:

Many thanks to those members who have taken on the responsibility of committee membership, the club can only continue to be successful if people step up and take on the important jobs on the committee.

Inverness Head - Congratulations to Emma McDonald who travelled up to Inverness at the weekend to compete in the Morrison Construction Fours and Small boats head and won the WJu18 4x+, WJu18 2x and the WJu18 1x. Emma took part in the coxed quad in a composite with Glasgow RC and was partnered in the 2x by Olivia Davison from Glasgow RC.

A very successful weekend indeed! Well done Emma :o)

Sewage Works - The problems at the Sewage Works in Lochwinnoch have now been repaired and we are allowed access to the loch again. Please make sure you wash all boats and kit well before putting it away and don't forget to wash your hands and clothes after each outing.

Boston Marathon - Sunday 19th Sept. - Well the Boston Marathon went really well this year. The weather could not have been more different to last year with grey skies and gusty conditions making our teams deal with almost 51 miles of crosswinds and headwinds! Both the doubles were very pleased to see the finish line.

Caroline and Lesley had set themselves a challenging target of 4hrs 30minutes (one they just missed last year in better conditions) and they set off in very determined mood. For details of how they did during the day check out the twitter feed. They crossed the finish line in a time of 4hrs 29 minutes and 6 seconds to not only achieve their goal but also win their event, beating the second placed WNov 2x by 20 minutes!

Richard and Liam set off in a burst of adrenaline that saw them get to Bardney Lock in very quick time but that pace probably took a little too much out of them. They kept going and did very well to finish in 5hrs 16 minutes and 11 seconds just 16 minutes outside their optimistic target. A great achievement for a crew with only one years experience. Both Richard and Liam are attempting to raise a little money for charity and have set up just giving pages, please donate if you can. Full results for this years marathon can be found here.

There are already rumours of a couple of crews that are looking to compete in the Boston Marathon next year. If you have a screw loose and think it's something you might be interested in, have a chat to the crews that took part in this years race and see if you might want to give it a go. It was lots of fun for both the competitors and support crews and well worth experiencing at least once!

100 Club - The 100 Club exists to help Castle Semple Rowing Club raise much needed funds, at the same time it offers an opportunity for its participants to win as much as £100 for a modest monthly payment.

For every £1 stake, members of the 100 Club are given entry to the monthly draw. There are prizes of £100 to be won in February, May, August and November and £25 prizes in each of the remaining months. You can have as many entries each month as you like and feel satisfied if you don't win that it's going to a good cause!

There are a pile of entry forms down at the clubhouse on the notice board or download a copy right now! Hand any completed forms in to Lesley or leave them in the plastic envelope on the notice board for her to collect.

Photo's - Loads of people have been taking photo's of the breathtaking views we have at the moment so I have set up a photobucket account for the club. The idea is that any club member can upload their photo's to the account to make it quicker and easier to share them. If you want to upload any photo's go to http://photobucket.com/. The user name is csrcpics and the password is the same as the members section of the website. If you don't know the password just drop me a line and I will send it to you. I look forward to seeing all of your amazing pictures :o)

Committee Minutes - The minutes have been updated in the Forum. You must be registered to see them, doesn't take long to register just click the register button and drop me an email with your username and email address so I can authorise you.

Results - I have updated the results for this year. Can you all please have a look. This has been done using results I have been emailed and I know there are results and crew member names missing. We would like to have a complete record of our successes from regattas and head races for the season. Email me with any ammendments or additions.

If you have a crew at a head race can you get in touch with me and let me know how you get on and the names of your crew. Thanks!

New Links - I've updated the links page to add a load of websites that are quite handy if you want to do a bit of shopping, clothing, boats and accessories are all covered. If anyone has any more that I haven't covered, drop me a line and let me know.

Boston Marathon - 19th September

2011 Rowing Calender - The events calender for 2011 is now up on the SARA website. There is an edited version in the training and crew notices section of the Forum.

Results - For more detailed results go to the Racing/Results page

Club Scratch Regatta - What a great day! We had sunshine, good food and good racing. A full list of winners is now up on the Racing/Results page. Thanks to all those who organised the event and helped out on the day. Already looking forward to next years!

100 Club - The 100 Club winners for the whole year are in the AGM minutes on the Forum.

Get your kit on! - Dot kindly organised a club kit page on the Godfrey Website for you now to place your orders for kit directly. Godfrey will add up all the discounts etc. from orders placed and calculate the discount due.

Recent Sponsors

Menzies Hotel Glasgow - 0141 222 2929 www.menzies-hotels.co.uk

Bowfield Hotel and Country Club - 01505 705225 www.bowfieldhotel.co.uk

Power Doors - 01505 842176 www.powerdoors.co.uk

William Tracey Group - 01505 321000 www.williamtraceygroup.com

Scottish Maritime Museums - 01294 278283 www.scottishmaritimemuseum.org.uk

Caledonian MacBrayne - 0800 0665000 www.calmac.co.uk

Ashoka Johnstone - 01505 336363 www.ashokarestaurants.com

Hannah's Sweets - 01505 321131

Tesco Kilbirnie www.tesco.com

Now & Then Lochwinnoch - 01505 843311

Con-fused Arts - www.con-fusedarts.co.uk

All About Flowers - 01505 500388

Sanderson-Brown Photography http://sanderson-brown.com/

La Dolce Vita, Lochwinnoch - 01505 843372

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