Sitting in my kitchen writing this news letter is a sad indication of the situation that we find ourselves in. White stains on my fingers and the smell of fresh paint in my house is another sign that things are not normal: DIY is not listed as one of my super powers. We are all desperate to get back to our day jobs and get our youngsters active again. Goodness knows what effect this latest lockdown will have on them, but we are ready to help them get back on track. The information that we have at present is that pupils will start to return from Monday 8^th March and we will be ready from this date. Will this return date include Year 8? Who knows? But when your rowers are back in school and are ready to go please give us as much notice as possible. Most of our coaches are self employed or students and may well have to move things around to accommodate rowing sessions.

We can though report on some activity from the end of last year. We managed to squeeze in our capsize drill during the last days of the Autumn Term. This was very much a last-minute thing and I was delighted with the way the schools adapted and made the most of the occasion. The swimming ability of our group is still on average very poor but it is better than a few years ago. Buoyancy aids will remain the order of the day whilst the youngsters are on the water. Many thanks to LiveWire for making this event happen, their team were very helpful and understanding.

Over the years we have worked with London Youth Rowing and behind the scenes they have been a great help to us. We have always tried to support the National Junior Indoor Rowing Championships which is their flagship event. Sadly this event fell foul of Covid but they managed to replace it with a virtual indoor rowing league and every month there is a new challenge. All of our schools took part in the December Challenge and we were going to carry on with this excellent scheme through the winter but Covid had other ideas. The competition is open to anybody, anywhere and there were even a number of entries from Australia and New Zealand. We did though have some excellent performances. Our old girls Iffy Marinos (Boteler now Priestley) won the girls age 17. Elle Kadir (Culcheth now Priestley) won the girls age 16 and was the fastest of all the girls. Kimberley Bentun (Birchwood) was joint 3^rd with Elina Bormane (Padgate) in age 13 behind two young ladies from New Zealand. Tamara Collar (Cardinal Newman) was 3^rd in age 12. For the boys Michael Kadir (Culcheth) won the age 15 by a margin. Evan Wray (Birchwood) placed 2^nd in the age 14 with Steven Davies (Padgate) a close 3^rd. Lucas Tinkley (Cardinal Newman), Kam Finni (Knutsford Academy) and K Stone (Bridgewater) all shared the top spot in age 13. Lucas Tinkley and Ollie Stanton (Cardinal Newman) came 1^st and 2^nd respectively in age 12.  If any schools would like to present medals for these results please let me know and I am sure I can find some for you to hand out. For the full results go to the London Youth Rowing website on the online league page where you can find us in the December results.

Assuming that we do get back on the water at some stage in this academic year, we have our end of year regatta to look forward to. Initially we had it down as Monday 28^th June but we have pushed this back to Wednesday 7^th July starting at 3pm and finishing around 6pm. It will be on the banks of The River Mersey at Warrington Rowing Club and it will be a great opportunity for our young athletes to show off their skills in front of family and friends who will all be welcome. Please come along and support this inspiring event.

Can I remind all school heads that we would be delighted to see you during any of our training sessions and we might even take you for a ride in one of the coaching launches!

We have recently become members of The Sport and Recreation Alliance and we were featured in their Daily Update. To see the article, follow this link.

https://www.sportandrecreation.org.uk/news/children%20and%20young%20people/alliance-shines-spotlight-on-warrington-youth

I will close by reminding you about ‘Easy fundraising’, if you don’t already support any other cause, please list Warrington Youth Rowing. It will cost you nothing but will be a great help to us.

Kind regards and let’s hope for better news soon.

Richard

07970796917    richard@warringtonyouthrowing.org.uk

We stopped operating on 17^th March and sadly, there was no Youth Rowing activity until Sir Thomas Boteler braved the sunshine on the 21^st of September. The shadow that Covid-19 cast will be remembered for decades to come. The dark days of spring and early summer are hopefully being replaced by an autumn term, full of hope, imagination and eager young rowers.

We have not been idle during the downtime and have taken the opportunity to review all our back-office activities. Elaine, our new Trustee, has done a sterling job sorting out all the paper work involved in keeping our coaches qualified, up to date and effective. Club and school contracts are also being implemented as well as policies to keep our youngsters safe. These policies can be viewed on our website: www.warringtonyouthrowing.org.uk.

Sadly, we will lose one of the highlights of 2020/21; our trip to The Copper Box in London for NJIRC has fallen foul of Covid. This a great shame as it has become the focus of our winter indoor programme. This will also mean that our social highlight, a Fundraising Dinner at Mere Court, will also be a casualty of Covid. The dinner has been a great show case for us as well as a major fundraiser; we can assure everybody it will be back. The lack of our trip to NJIRC means that we will be reshaping our indoor activities and there is an exciting new programme being developed by our friends at London Youth Rowing. It will involve a number of sites in GB and other bases around the world are also being invited to take part. The beauty of this scheme is the low cost in money and time, it can be completed during a normal session. More news of this exciting new venture will follow as it becomes available.

We have also undergone some major changes.

Mersey Youth Rowing has moved house. The arrangements that we had at Mersey Rowing Club and Liverpool Watersports Centre were becoming increasingly unpractical. It was fun to row just under the iconic Liverpool sky line, but sadly things didn’t work out. So, we have relocated to Liverpool Victoria (Vics) Rowing Club, which for those who don’t know is based on the West Float Dock, Birkenhead. Vics have welcomed us with open arms and there are a number of advantages to being based there. Amongst these will be the use of their gym area in the winter months – a big improvement for our coaches who spent most of last year lugging ergos around the City and delivering sessions in our schools. It has though meant that our pool of schools is changing, for some getting to Birkenhead is just a step too far. Ironically, for some schools it is easier and so schools such as North Liverpool and De La Salle will continue with the project. We have added Fazackerley and we look forward to welcoming them all to our new home. We will now be casting our net in Birkenhead in search of new rowers from the local area.

Our coaches have also changed, Paul has moved on and Jess will now be working solely in Warrington. We have though gained Jessica and Libby who are both at University in Liverpool. Ralph also joins the gang that will be led by last year’s coach, Sam. Our Ambassadors for Mersey now include Professor Zoe Knowles of Liverpool John Moores University; she is keen to get involved helping to promote Mersey Youth Rowing.

Northwich Youth Rowing is starting to blossom into life. This was a logical step for us as links between Warrington and Northwich Rowing Clubs have always been strong. Northwich is an ideal base for us to strike out into the heartland of Cheshire as well as serving the town of Northwich. Initial interest has been strong with 8 schools registering a keen interest. Covid though has damped the enthusiasm of some schools joining the programme. NYR have started to work with Knutsford Academy and it is hoped Hartford and Weaverham Schools will be starting soon.

Kevin will be leading the NYR coaching team that will also include Carole, Helen, Mary and Dave. Their line-up of Ambassadors is impressive with ex-WYR coach and now Police Officer, Phil Lyons, stepping into more ceremonial shoes. He is joined by the pride of Northwich Rowing Club Matt Langridge, current Olympic Champion and passionate supporter of the scheme. Ex England and Lancashire cricketer Peter Martin also joins the team. He is new to the sport and is involved at Northwich as a parent, but is very keen on youth development in sport.

Warrington have also added a couple of new coaches and we are delighted that Janet and Lauren will be joining us. Our new Ambassador is Ric Egington and he will be dropping in from time to time when he is in the area. Ric is a former junior at Warrington and went on to win two Olympic Medals and two World Championships. Our Warrington schools are returning and we are close to full strength. We are delighted that New Horizons will be joining us this academic year and it will be interesting to see what effect our sport has on the pupils. Despite this, the cloud of Covid is still hanging around, it may dampen our activities. Strange, very strange times, but we will keep pushing on.

WYR would like to express out thanks to all the Heads and Schools that have started and are just about to start this academic year. We fully understand how difficult and different this year is; your vote of confidence by simply continuing with us is greatly appreciated. For those schools that have yet to start please let us know if there is anything we can do to help, our programme is very flexible and our coaches are ready to get going.

The Half Term break has just been and we were able to run a British Rowing Coaching Course at WRC. This was the first and only course to run in GB since lockdown and we are very grateful to Rachel Hooper and the Coach Education Team at BR for getting it off the ground. Things though were very different, the first day was done through a virtual platform and the practical days were all very Covid safe. The success of the course means that Joe Peacock of North Liverpool is now a qualified rowing coach. As is Rachel Ince of Knutsford Academy and Paul McKean of Cardinal Newman Catholic High School. It is very good of theses teachers to give up their holiday time to enhance their knowledge of the sport. As well as the 3 teachers, 5 new members of our coaching team were also able to complete the course. WYR have now put almost 30 coaches through their basic training, a great way to facilitate the expansion of our sport.

Capsize drills have not yet happened but I am waiting to see if we can get one organised for late November or early December, it all depends on Covid!

A couple of our old girls are embarking on selection for the GB Junior Rowing Team and this can be an expensive process. To help them along the way Warrington Youth Rowing has set up a fund called First Step, the aim of which is to help our alumni realise their dreams of representing their country. If you are in a position to do so, any contributions gratefully received!

Lastly if you know about Easyfundraising and you don’t support anybody, please can I politely ask you to list Warrington Youth Rowing as your chosen charity. The same goes for Amazon Prime, we are now on their list. These two schemes cost nothing to contribute to but can make a difference.

All the best

Richard

richard@warringtonyouthrowing.org.uk

What a wonderful message of encouragement and motivation from Sir Steve Redgrave CBE – winner of five consecutive Olympic Gold Medals, not to mention the three Commonwealth and nine World Rowing Championship Gold Medals!

As the most successful male rower in Olympic history, we were thrilled and moved to receive this and share with our young rowers.

We stopped operating on 17^th March and sadly, there has been no activity since then. The shadow that the dreadful Covid-19 has cast will be remembered for decades to come. Dark days in spring and early summer are hopefully being replaced by a new autumn season, full of hope and imagination. Fingers crossed activity will start Monday 21^st September, nearly 27 weeks later!

We have not been idle and have taken the opportunity to review all our back office activities. Elaine our new Trustee has done a sterling job sorting out all the paper work involved in keeping our coaches qualified, up to date and effective. Club and school contracts are also being implemented as well as policies to keep our youngsters safe whilst in our care. These policies can be viewed on our website.

Sadly, we will lose one of the highlights of 2020/21; our trip to The Copper Box in London for NJIRC has fallen foul of Covid. This a great shame as it has become the focus of our winter indoor programme. This will also mean that our social highlight, i.e., Dinner at Mere Court will be another casualty of Covid. The Dinner has been a great show case for us as well as a major fundraiser; we can assure everybody it will be back. The lack of our trip to NJIRC means that we will be reshaping our indoor activities and there is an exciting new programme being developed by our friends at London Youth Rowing. More news to follow as it becomes available.

We have also undergone some major changes.

Mersey Youth Rowing has moved house. The arrangements that we had at Mersey Rowing Club and Liverpool Watersports Centre were becoming increasingly unpractical. It was fun to row just under the iconic Liverpool sky line, but sadly things didn’t work out. Phone calls were made and we have relocated to Liverpool Victoria (Vics) Rowing Club, which for those who don’t know is based on the West Float Dock, Birkenhead. The Vics have welcomed us with open arms and there are a number of advantages to being based there. Amongst these will be the use of their gym area in the winter months – a big improvement for our coaches who spent most of last year lugging ergos around the City and delivering sessions in our schools. It has though meant that our pool of schools is changing, as for some getting to Birkenhead is just a step too far. Ironically, for some schools it is easier and so schools such as North Liverpool and De La Salle will continue with the project. We have added Fazackerley and we look forward to welcoming them all to our new home. We will now be casting our net in Birkenhead in search of new rowers from the local area.

Our coaches have also changed, Paul has moved on and Jess will now be working solely in Warrington. We have though gained Jessica and Libby who are both at University in Liverpool. Ralph also joins the gang that will be led by last year’s coach Sam. Our Ambassadors for Mersey now include Professor Zoe Knowles of Liverpool John Moores University; she is keen to get involved helping to promote Mersey Youth Rowing.

Northwich Youth Rowing is starting to blossom into life. This was a logical step for us as links between Warrington and Northwich Rowing Clubs have always been strong. Northwich is an ideal base for us to strike out into the heartland of Cheshire as well as serving the town of Northwich. Initial interest has been strong with 8 schools registering a keen interest. Covid though has damped the enthusiasm of some schools joining the programme hence, NYR are looking forward to welcoming Knutsford and Weaverham Schools as trail blazers for the scheme.

Kevin will be leading the NYR coaching team that will also include Carole, Helen, Mary and Dave. Their line up of Ambassadors is impressive with ex-WYR coach and now Police Officer, Phil Lyons, stepping into more ceremonial shoes. He is joined by the pride of Northwich Rowing Club Matt Langridge, current Olympic Champion and passionate supporter of the scheme. Ex England and Lancashire cricketer Peter Martin also joins the team. He is new to the sport and is involved at Northwich as a parent, but is very keen on youth development in sport.

Warrington have also added a couple of new coaches and we are delighted that Janet and Lauren will be joining us. Our new Ambassador is Ric Egington and he will be dropping in from time to time when he is in the area. Ric is a former junior at Warrington and went on to win Olympic Medals and World Championships.

Our Warrington schools are returning and Sir Thomas Boteler are as ever are first out of the blocks. The cloud of Covid though is hanging around and it may yet dampen our activities. Strange, very strange times, but we will keep going.

The Henley Regatta Charitable Trust have agreed to fund a further expansion and as such Northwich Youth Rowing will (hopefully) be starting in September. They will be based at Northwich Rowing Club and serve the schools  in Mid Cheshire.

Northwich Rowing Club are very supportive of the project and the lead coach will be Kevin Jump. He is a well known figure in the rowing world and has been coaching in Warrington for the past year.

Like  so many other organisations, Warrington Youth Rowing and Mersey Youth Rowing had to close their doors on 17th March due to the global COVID-19 pandemic.

Naturally the safety of our rowers, coaches and of course the local community is our priority as well as adhering to government guidelines.

We want to reassure you though, that we are still working in the background on further expansion plans and are very much looking forward to welcoming our young people back to the water as soon as possible.

We are incredibly excited and proud to have been shortlisted in The British Rowing Awards for the Rowing Project of the Year category.

Thanks to everyone who makes our programme one worthy of being shortlisted, and to the North West Regional Rowing Council for the nomination.

The winners will be announced at an event on 21st March.

September 2016 saw the first school take part in the Warrington Youth Rowing programme.

Three years later, we took our life changing initiative to Liverpool and launched Mersey Youth Rowing to great success.

We are now incredibly excited to announce that September of this year will see the launch of our programme in Northwich.

This means we will be dealing with about 25 non rowing secondary schools and nearly 300 youngsters – each of them on the Pupil Premium Register.

It’s such a privilege to be able to do our bit to improve young lives and demonstrate the immense power of sport.

Watch this space for more information about our latest programme…

7am. Friday 28th February 2020. 16 adults. 26 children.

It must be NJIRC Day!

Yes last Friday saw pupils from both Warrington Youth Rowing and Mersey Youth Rowing head off on the train to London to compete at the National Junior Indoor Rowing Championships.

And what a day it was. An early start at Liverpool Lime Street and Warrington Bank Quay respectively, the two teams met, put on their brand new kit and headed to Euston. From here we headed over to Kings Cross to board the train to Stratford International where we walked to the Copper Box Arena. Joining hundreds of young people to compete in lots of different races throughout the day.

Everyone did absolutely brilliantly – representing their schools and WYR and MYR respectively. Many of our young people got well into the Top 10 and we even got a medal in Year 8 Boys category with Mersey’s Kevin Dos Santos coming in a fantastic third place!

Check out the highlights of the day in this video.

HUGE well done everyone and many thanks to all the volunteers for helping make the trip happen.

This was an experience that everyone will remember and cherish for a very long time.

This half term has been very cold and as such we have been doing all of our work in the gym or indeed, any indoor space that we can utilise. We have also had the target of our Indoor Rowing Competitions to work towards and this has been a good vehicle for our youngsters to focus on.

Wednesday 29^th January saw the Mersey Youth Rowing team invade Cardinal Heenan Catholic High School. We were able to inhabit a great space with a stage and huge screen that was linked to a digital projector. The IT set up enabled us to screen an image of the races for everybody in the room to enjoy. Head Teacher – Ms K Smyth – was a welcome guest and she was able to witness some very competitive racing, and even hand out some of the hard earned prizes. Mersey Youth Rowing is very grateful for allowing us to use her school facilities and making us most comfortable.

The racing was very keenly contested with our 5 schools being joined by King David School, St Nicholas and St Francis of Assisi. I am glad to report that in the important Year 8 races, our schools led the way home. This is the Year Group that we have been working with and it was from this pool of rowers that we selected our teams to represent us at The National Junior Indoor Rowing Championships. In the Boys’ competition, Kevin Dos Santos of North Liverpool scored a very strong 801 meters to win the race; this is a score that should have him well placed in London. It would also have been the winning score the day after in Warrington. The Girls’ race also produced another winner from North Liverpool, with a very impressive 763 meters from Blanche Villacorta. Interestingly, this score would also have been victorious in Warrington. North Liverpool also swept the board in the Year 8 relay races.  Our team for London is made up of 5 athletes from North Liverpool, 4 from St Hildas and 1 from De La Salle. Let’s hope they enjoy the experience of racing in the iconic Copper Box Arena.

The day after on Thursday 30^th January, we pitched up at Birchwood School Sports Hall for our Warrington/Cheshire Schools’ Competition. This was again a great venue, a double sports hall with pull out seating providing room for nearly 300 young rowers. Thanks to Birchwood Head – Emma Mills – for allowing us to use this fabulous facility. Sadly one of our 9 Warrington Schools couldn’t make it, but we were joined by Tarporley High School, Fallibroome and Congleton High Schools. We were also joined by The Russett School, Oaklands School, Hebden Green and Springfield. The children at these schools all have their own challenges and it was very encouraging to see them compete at the same event as the able bodied students.

As the previous day, one school led the way in the Year 8 competition. Padgate High School won the Boys and Girls’ individual events with Tyler Dunn and Megan Reynolds taking the honours. Padgate also managed to clean up in the relay events and win the Year 8 shields for Schools Indoor Rowing Champions. Warrington Youth Rowing is off to NJIRC for the 3^rd time and our team is a cosmopolitan mix of the majority of our participating schools.

Our indoor competitions were greatly assisted by Dan Hetherington of British Rowing. Dan supervised the race systems on both days and his help was invaluable. Concept 2 was very helpful, loaning us the rowing machines. Jo at LSSP and Penny at WASSP also had a valuable input into the organisation of these events.   We had a large bank of volunteers that helped out and I would like to thank everybody that gave up their valuable time to make these events a great experience for the children involved.

Rounding off indoor rowing, one of our coaches Cam Nyland recently became the Ladies Open Age Champion at The English Indoor Championships. Cam is training very hard in her quest for a place in the British U23 Rowing Team and it’s great that she can share her experiences with some of our students.

Our project in Liverpool has been suffering in recent times as our base at The Watersports Centre has been closed for refurbishment. Our latest update is that it will be open again in March, let’s hope it stays on target to open then. Our Liverpool coaches Jess, Sam and Paul are doing an excellent job keeping the scheme going, ferrying the ergos to the schools and running sessions there. We are targeting a return to the water ASAP!

We are hoping to add some new schools to the Liverpool scheme in time to start next September. We have had some very promising talks with schools that are keen to get involved with the scheme.

Warrington continues to operate well, but as in Liverpool the weather is proving to be problematic and indoor sessions are the order of the day. We will be trying hard to get back on the water as soon as the weather will allow.

The green shoots of another site are beginning to emerge and by our next newsletter I would hope that I will be able to share more information with you.

Looking to the near future, we have our regatta at the end of June on Tuesday 30th.  We have decided to have one event based at Warrington Rowing Club. This will enable us to have a bigger event and the plan is to guarantee all the athletes at least 2 races. We would like to start at 2pm, finishing at 6 pm. Can School Leads and Heads please ensure that transport links are booked well in advance as this is a great showcase for us. It is also a valuable experience for the pupils; this may well be the only chance that many of them will have to represent their school, especially in front of a large crowd of supporters, teachers, and parents. More details nearer the time.

Please feel to contact us or check out the rest of our site. We love showing people what we can do!