Bittersweet memories.

Murray started coaching at St. Bede’s in 1972/73 season coaching the younger St. Bede’s oarsman. His coaching mentor at the time, Ted Lindstrom, asked NZ legendary coach Rusty Robinson to help and Murray drove the boat and watched and listened as Rusty coached. He took over coaching the senior rowers in the 1973/74 season. St. Bede’s had a senior four and a senior eight. They did not win the Head of the River but did manage, a couple of weeks later, to win the first South Island championship on the Avon River. The Maadi Cup in 1974 was held in Whanganui but a poor lane draw had an adverse effect on their performance.

During these years Elite Men rowed 2,000m, Junior Men (U19) rowed 1,500m and women rowed 1,000m. For the 1975 and 1976 seasons the Maadi Cup regattas were rowed over the 1,500m distance, which made the Avon a viable venue albeit the width limited the races one could race in.

During the 1974/5 season, the school got a new Donoratico eight from Italy. Under Ted Lindstrom’s guidance setting things up, Murray led the charge for the school to win both the senior four and eight at both the Head of the River and the South Island Champs and head into the Maadi Cup regatta with a realistic chance of winning. Unfortunately, due to a limited number of lanes on the Avon River, rowers had to choose between rowing the eight or the four, you could not row both. St. Bede’s chose the eight. We made the four-boat final. It was such a long day sitting and waiting for just one race. I remember Murray pacing around, chain-smoking, he looked more nervous than we did. In fact, I think he made us more nervous than we might otherwise have been.

It was a good race but we only managed third. It was quite a spectacular event, with a long line of cars racing along the road beside the river, including half the boarding school hanging out of big red, screaming St. Bede’s along.

The 1975/76 season saw a number of rowers return, including George Keys. George who won a red coat in 1976, rowing for the Avon Premier eight at only 16 years of age. He returned to school rowing after the national champs to row in the senior four and eight. Murray had got the other boys together and many had been training over the Christmas break. The crew were now used to the Donoratico skiff and they headed into what looked like a promising school season. We won both events at the Head of the River (on the Avon) and the South Island Champs (on Waihola). The Maadi Cup regatta was held at Karapiro. With six lanes available rowers could row in both the four and the eight.

It was with great pleasure that the members of those crews watched St. Bede’s win the Springbok Four and the Maadi Cup this year. It also brought back bittersweet memories of the 1976 Maadi Cup regatta. The four of Andy McGregor, Mark Meates, George Keys, and Denny Petersen performed well in the heats and had a great chance to become the first South Island crew to win the four. Finals day saw a strong wind early in the day that created a pretty choppy surface. The St. Bede’s skiff, named the Jarrow, was not a big boat and the choppy conditions meant the four were struggling. We got to the front but didn’t clear out like we usually did. We caught a crab with about 10 strokes to go and got passed by Hamilton Boys, we came back, much like the Hamilton Boys eight this year but like them couldn’t get in front. It was the closest a St. Bede’s crew would come to winning the four until this year.

Conditions had settled down by the time of the Maadi eights race. In this race, Westlake jumped out to a good lead and along with St. Bede’s cleared out from the rest. Again very reminiscent of this year’s race, bat alas we were like Hamilton Boys coming from behind and like them didn’t quite make it, more like a foot than an inch. Both crews beat the world's fastest time for Junior men’s eights at the time. Quite a race. I think it was the first time Westlake had won the Maadi Cup, they were coached by Eric Craise, former NZ coach in 1964, who had already coached Mt. Albert Grammar to 7 Maadi Cup victories.

Murray was a great coach and it took someone with Eric’s pedigree to beat him. It was Murray’s passion and enthusiasm that lifted the boys to great heights. With technical guidance from Ted Lindstrom, St. Bede’s were well served for coaching under Murray’s reign. He gave so much of his personal time to coach, and a big thanks must go to his family for allowing him to do so. Not only did he coach rowing in the summer but he coached rugby at the Marist Club in the winter. After the ‘76 season, Murray became the head coach at the Marist Rugby Club which limited his involvement in St. Bede’s rowing but rather shows his versatility as a coach.

I think St. Bede’s became a real threat in NZ schoolboy rowing while Murray was in charge. We have not always achieved those heights but I believe that it gave St. Bede’s rowers a platform from which they could believe they could get there and eventually they did, and well done again to the 2023 crews.

No surprise that Murray’s sons were great rowers for St. Bedes. David also rowed for NZ U23 and Nick rowed in the winning Maadi Cup boat in 1991. Murray would have been so proud to see his grandson in this year’s eight.

It is people like Murray Giera that make St. Bede’s rowing so great. He would have been so happy to see St. Bede’s as the best boys school at this year's Maadi Regatta but I think, rightfully, also a little proud that he played a big part in getting it started.

Murray Giera was born in a refugee camp in Germany and he and his parents moved to New Zealand in 1950. Murray's father took a job as a tractor driver at Mt Torlesse Station in Central Canterbury so the family settled there with Murray starting school at Kowai Bush. Murray picked up English at school and taught his parents in the evenings. He began at St Bede’s in 1960 as a boarder, when the family moved to Christchurch he became a day boy. As an old boy, Murray was also a member of the Board of Trustees, and President of the Old Boys Association. He was an active member of the Real Estate Institute committee, chairman of the New Zealand First National Real Estate group, and an elected member of the Real Estate Licensing Board. Murray was the instigator and management creator of Science Alive! in Christchurch and also set up rental property income to supplement entrance fees and grants and was one of the founders of the 6A drop-in centre for street kids and the homeless in the early 1970s. Murray died in 2013 just 11 days before he was to receive a Queen's Service Medal in the New Year honours for his decades of community service.