On Saturday 29th April, Year 11 student Harry Crouch was selected to represent Australia at the World Junior Rowing Championships, to be held in Trakai, Lithuania in August 2017. Harry was selected to row in the two seat of the Under 19 Men’s Quad Scull. The crew is made up of four rowers from Sydney. The other three rowers are Year 12 students, two currently at Shore (Jackson Kench and Lachlan Stevenson) and the other at St Augustine’s (Daniel Samus).

In order to gain selection, Harry competed in a series of selection races spread over a week at Penrith. The selection trials commenced with a 2k erg test, in which Harry achieved his PB time of 6min 15 seconds. This placed him third overall on weight adjusted ranking out of 80 rowers trying out for the team. Harry then went through a series of sculling races, in which he ended up ranked 4th overall in a very high quality field. This ranking ensured Harry was able to be placed in a strong crew for the remainder of the trials and his crew ended up going well under the bench mark times set by the Australian rowing selectors. The trials were a harrowing experience, with trialling rowers being cut out each day in Survivor elimination style.

To make this feat more remarkable, in the two weeks leading into the selection regatta, Harry effectively trained on his own, as he went home to Condobolin for the holidays, many miles from the nearest rowing club or coaches. Harry had to travel considerable distances in order to row each day. He split his training across three different waterways. Long rows were done out at Lake Cargelligo, while shorter rows were done on a small dam near Condobolin or on a creek near Forbes. In addition, Harry’s house was severely damaged in floods earlier in the year and his family has had to live in a caravan.

We commend Harry on this achievement and we wish him all the best with the hard training that he will do through the winter in preparation for the World Championships.