Rowing Blogger of the Year Awards – Girl on the River Celebrates Her First Win

Anyone who has followed Girl on the River’s exploits will have noticed something of a theme emerging – namely my consistent failure to win. Countless tearful posts have documented a series of near misses, race day disasters, dashed hopes and disappointments. Until today, that is.

The lovely people at Rowperfect have established the Rowing Blogger of the Year Awards and to my astonishment, Girl on the River is one of this year’s winners. What particularly tickles me is that I’ve won in the “athlete” category, where I was up against two very fine international rowers, Drew Ginn and Nathaniel Reilly-O’Donnell. I think it’s safe to say that this will be the only time in my rowing career where I come in ahead of a world class rower – and possibly the only occasion on which I’ll ever be described as an “athlete” (I so wish my school P.E. teacher were around to witness it) – so I’m thoroughly enjoying the moment.

I should also say that the other blogs on the list are all well worth a read; mostly reporting from the world of elite rowing, they give fascinating insights into how the other half rows. I’ve been regularly glued to them and am well and truly humbled to have been picked out from such an impressive crowd.

So there you have it. I may be the oldest novice in town. I may have to fling a hoodie over the erg monitor so nobody sees how bad my split is. I may be more likely to win a wooden spoon than a gold medal for my rowing. But today I’m a winning athlete and it feels good.