Rowers from Jesus College Boat Club (JCBC) enjoyed a fine night at Queens’ Ergs 2016 on Tuesday evening at Queens’ College’s Fitzpatrick Hall, as the Jesuans NW1 crew and Mixed Senior crew secured first place in their respective categories. 

Elsewhere, there was success for the Gonville & Caius NM1 crew as they finished on top in their category, and for Robinson’s NM2 crew and Lucy Cavendish’s NW2 crew, who each finished as the fastest Seconds boats in the competition.

The Queens’ Ergs is an intercollegiate rowing competition in which both novice and senior rowers from across the University’s 33 colleges race in an 8 x 500-metre indoor relay on an ergometer, in what has become the second largest indoor rowing event in Europe. Indeed, the 2016 event saw over 1,000 rowers compete and it will be rowers from JCBC who will be best pleased with their performances, having emerged victorious in two divsions and only missing out on a clean sweep of all three main divisions by two seconds.

The night began with a number of preliminary heats, in which all the competing crews looked to secure their place in the 12-crew finals at the end of the night. A strong start in the opening heat from the hosts saw their NM1 crew win out, pushing a strong Anglia Ruskin boat into second place. Following suit in winning their heats were Downing NM1 and Murray Edwards NW1, while Jesus NM1 also prevailed in their preliminary race, leaving the rest of their competitors for dead in their preliminary race. 

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A clash between Darwin NW1, St Catharine’s NW1 and Jesus NW1 produced one of the most exciting heats of the evening, with the Jesuans edging out their rivals. And in the next heat, featuring crews of both genders, Caius' MN1 laid down a marker with a convincing victory while Homerton’s NW1 held off their two rivals to take the top spot.

A 15-boat heat followed, which Newnham’s NW1 won comfortably, but the sheer effort put in by the rowers throughout the heats had begun to take its toll on the equipment: a technical hitch meant the performance of six crews required manual recording. This did little to detract from the excitement, however, as Downing’s NM2 came out of nowhere in the last 500 metres so edge past Trinity’s NM3 and Churchill’s NM2.

And the lower boats continued to entertain in the final heat of the night, with all eyes focusing on watching Darwin’s NM2 fail to prevent Trinity Hall’s NM2 and Wolfson’s NM1 from catching them after they took an early boat length lead in dramatic fashion.

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The Mixed Senior boats got the first of the evening's finals underway, as twelve crews of experienced college rowers battled it out for the title. There were a number of fierce performances: a lightning-quick opening leg of 1.19.17 from Jesus saw them take an early lead, with Darwin, Anglia Ruskin and Selwyn ever present threats. But the Selwynites had too much to do and the Darwinians, recording two slow legs in the final part of the race, allowed the Jesuans to pull through to claim the first title of the competition with an average time of 1.35.3 seconds per leg.

The Novice Women's final was a similarly exciting affair. As every one of 12 teams put in a major shift, it was anyone's race to win early on but as the legs passed by, Darwin and Caius were neck and neck out in front, with Trinity running them a close third. But, out of nowhere, JCBC emerged as the main threat after a massive seventh leg that saw them outstrip Darwin and Caius, who had to settle with second and third respectively. 

Going into the Men's Novice final, the last race of Queens' Ergs 2016, the Jesuans were gunning for a clean sweep, with confidence high after their comprehensive victory in the heat. In the early few legs of the race, however, they were virtually anomynous, as Caius took an early lead with Queens' and Anglia Ruskin battling to keep up. And it was not until the closing stages of the race that JCBC began to threaten as they moved into third place, yet they had left themselves too much to do: a calm final leg performance from Caius took them over the line to victory. 

Novice Men's Winner: Gonville & Caius

Novice Women's Winner: Jesus

Fastest Mixed Senior Crew: Jesus

Fastest Men's Seconds Crew: Robinson

Fastest Women's Seconds Crew: Lucy Cavendish