While most teenagers spent their summer break sleeping in or hanging out with their friends every day, the Queen's rowing crew was waking up at five am to train down at the Harbour, getting prepared for the many regattas being held over the summer.

We ended the school year with two regattas, one in Dunstan, which was the novices first ever race, and the other the Otago Champs at Lake Ruataniwha in Twizel. Unfortunately the senior crews only got to race once, and the novices didn't get to race at all that weekend, due to the weather. Then it was Christmas and the squad were spread far and wide across the country. But, that didn’t stop our training! Our coach gave us a hard schedule of workouts so we could maintain our fitness over the break, like runs, circuits or bike rides. That fitness was all leading up to the Canterbury Champs on the 16th of January. For the novices this was the first time rowing in lanes and having to steer in the buoys. No easy feat! The seniors made finals and the novices made one final, although again the weather meant the regatta finished early. Then we were back home to keep training for South Island Club Champs, the weekend before we started school. At this regatta the whole team made finals for almost every event we entered - qualifying for 3 A finals and 4 B finals amongst our small squad of 8. We also had crews from both the seniors and novices making A finals, although sadly no medals at the end of the weekend.

The rowing team will be working really hard over the next 4 weeks in preparation for the big one, the South Island Secondary Schools regatta in early March.

Senior crew - Ella Edwards, Ella Nesbit, Emmy Stedman

Novice crew - Billie Askerud, Adi Davies, Sarah Donaldson, Brydie Fox

Coxswain - Neve Hall

Ella Edwards and Billie Askerud