Pete Reed and Andy Triggs Hodge make it look easy
Photo by Peter Spurrier, Intersport Images
There are two things I really, really want to achieve in rowing this summer season (in addition to nailing my first win). The first is to get out in a single scull (though not until the water warms up a lot). The second is to try rowing in a pair.
For rowing virgins out there, a pair is a boat with two people, each with one blade. It’s regarded as pretty challenging as the fewer people in a boat, the harder it is to balance, but that’s precisely why I want to try it. So I was pretty interested to find this video on just this subject, featuring interviews with some of the best in the game, including Pete Reed who (with Andrew Triggs Hodge) is a triple world silver medallist as well as winning a gold at Beijing in the four.
Martin Cross, gold medal winner in the 1984 Olympics, sums up the challenge: “The pair is the natural boat for the tough men of rowing – the people who want to prove something.”
And as Pete Reed adds, “There are no stabilisers… the skill factor is very high.”
One question remains, though: who will join me? I need someone who can match me in strength, and it’s a well known fact that I’m by far the strongest and heaviest in the ladies’ squad*.
Equally importantly, as one of the rowers interviewed said, “You’ve got to get on; it’s more of a marriage”.
So, then. 29th February may have passed, but I’m still getting down on bended knee. Who is willing to take my hand?
*possibly not entirely true; the opposite might even be the case