It all started, as these things do, with some idle Twitter chat with Matthew Pinsent about masters rowing categories.
“Went rowing with duffers this morning”, announced Pinsent.
“Define duffers,” demanded Girl on the River (extra coxing duties this week having brought out my bossy side).
“Ah”, said the Great Man. “C is seasoned, D duffer, E endangered”.
“I daren’t ask what you’d think of F”, spluttered David Biddulph.
The answer, as I might have expected, came from the Monmouth RC ladies’ rowing squad – from one of our Fabulous, Fierce and Feisty Masters F women.
“Matthew Pinsent hasn’t met the Monmouth Women’s Squad – yet!” she said.
“C is for ‘Cool, Collected & Competitive; D is for ‘Determined & Deadly; E is for ‘Energetic, Elegant & Explosive’ & F is just ‘F…ing Fantastic’. ”
So if you ever find yourself tempted to dismiss masters rowers as, well, duffers, know this. The, ahem, senior rowers may have the odd wrinkle, but we’re not ready to hang up our rigger jiggers yet. After all, we’re not called Masters for nothing.
