Catching up Part 1: Women’s Head of the River Race

3 March, 2012:

I have never been so motivated in my entire life. WeHORR (Women’s Head of the River Race) pushed me to my point of physical stamina, mental strength, and determination.

We got to the boat house around 8:30am for the start of what would be a ridiculously tiring day. The boys were about to get off of the water from an outing in preparation for the Supaerowing event in Toulouse the following week.

All of the girls were getting ready to go out and prepping ourselves in the changing room. We went out to the boat and then fixed our foot plates and waited for the right time to boat. Pelayo was the nicest of all of the guys and stayed to get our wellies out of the boat, which made all of the difference with our time! We ended up paddling down the river to a little bit past the start line so that we could marshall before the start of the race.

We were 180 in the draw so while we were marshaling, we were able to see around 150 crews at the start! It was a crazy experience to see all of those crews go off and an even better experience watching the 20 crews in front of us do a hairpin turn at the exact same time.

And at that point, we were building up to the start. Power strokes were on and then we were off!

I can’t even begin to tell you actually what was going on during the race because I was too focused on my stroke. It sounds incredibly cheesey, but that’s the truth. All I can remember of the 7000m race was sheer pain and Val’s voice screaming different things throughout the 24 minutes. It seemed as though every 10 strokes we were told to focus on something new. Whether it was the catch, slide, recovery, stroke length it was anything to keep our minds fresh and off of the fact that we were rowing all out for so long.

The one distinct part of the race that I do remember was the crew that started at 181 that was trying to overtake us. It was a battle for about 2 minutes of bow ball to bow ball until our crew pushed so hard that we pulled back our lead. We kept getting further and further away from the crew and that gave us an even greater amount of motivation to keep going. This happened a bit early in the race but we just kept on going.

Ultimately we finished 202 out of 287 crews which far surpassed our original goal of passing 250. We also came in 11th out of 40 in the Novice Academic category and beat 39 Intermediate crews over all! I am so incredibly proud of LSE Women’s Rowing.

The pain and suffering and overwhelming joy of rowing for 24:09.10 made up for the 9000 m row back to the boat house.

Check out the pics!

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Just a little update.

Happy March, everyone!

Last weekend was training for Global Poverty Ambassadors, and what an incredible weekend it was. I’m currently making a video log of some of the Ambassadors and their feelings about the weekend and it will be updated by Sunday. But for now, I’ll tell you a little bit about our current campaign, Protect Point 7.

There’s no better way to say it than how Sam did in the Global Poverty Project blog,

“12 years ago at the UN Millennium Summit, all 190 UN nations re-stated their commitment to work towards spending 0.7% of their countries income on international aid to help end extreme poverty.

The UK has been one of just a few countries to stick to this commitment. On March the 21st, the British Chancellor George Osborne will present his annual budget to Parliament. He will lay out his plans for the economy at a time when unemployment is still rising, the Eurozone is in continued difficulty and consumer confidence remains low. On the face of it, keeping this commitment to aid looks like a hard task.

And of course, this comes just weeks after the news that an opposition politician in India claimed that India neither wanted nor needed British aid. This lead to discussions of whether spending part of the little money we have as a country on international development is still a justifiable option. The government is under pressure to cut our aid budget, and with it, withdraw a lifeline to millions of the world’s poorest people.

While the government of India may be signing contracts to buy new military jets, 300 million people in the country continue to rank amongst the world’s poorest people. And more than this, regardless of how we feel about India, India is not the sole recipient of UK aid.

Whatever spending decisions the Chancellor decides to make, and however tough the current economic climate may be, we know that few people in this country will be left to try and live on only a pound a day. Yet across the world, for 1.4 billion people this is reality – trying to manage their food, heath, rent and travel all on the equivalent of just a pound a day (the definition of extreme poverty).

International aid can have an incredible effect on saving lives; the number of children dying before their fifth birthday has more than halved in the last 50 years, and since 1990 international aid has helped lift more than one billion people out of extreme poverty. Our aid has contributed to the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, TB and Malaria, helping to save at least 4,000 lives every day, and has saved an estimated 7.7 million lives in 150 countries.

Prime Minister David Cameron and Secretary of State for International Development Andrew Mitchell have repeatedly said that as a country we would not ‘balance the book on the backs of the world’s poor’. All three mainstream political parties committed to the 0.7% target before the last election, and it features in the coalition agreement; yet it is at risk in the 2012 budget.

That’s why today we are asking people to take action and contact their MP to tell them they believe that aid spending is important. We’re asking MPs to ask questions at the next International Development Questions on March 14th to ensure this government understands that taking money away from the world’s poorest option is not an option in this budget.

The government spends money on what it believes to be priorities, and without a vocal appreciation of the importance of aid and people standing up to protect it, we are in danger of losing it. So please, click here to take action and show your support for the 0.7% target, and ensure the Chancellor knows this isn’t a budget he can cut.”

If you would, go on facebook and “like” the page we have created for Protect Point 7 at this link http://www.facebook.com/protectpoint7 and post a photo of yourself holding a sign that describes your appreciation for the government to Protect Point 7. If you really want to help, write a letter to your MP! Also, you can tweet to #0.7

We will also be going to Parliament to lobby on March 6!

As for Rowing, Women’s Head of the River is on Saturday! I’m looking forward to the 7km race that will test not only my strength, but my determination and will.

I’ll get back to you with more info related to everything soon.

xx Kerry

What a Day for LSE Rowing!

There’s nothing like the feeling you get when you are racing. I could not even expect what I felt on Saturday during our race for UH Head. Not only did we do as well as we thought we could do, but we finished even better than expected! Our practice run of the 3,600 m course last week was enlightening and we knew just how much we needed to push for the race.

The girls got to the UL Boat House at 11am and waited for our coxswain to get out of her meeting so that we could take our boat out. We ended up just flipping our boat in the racks so that we could change all of the footplates to be placed closer to our seats. This is because we share the black 8 with the Novice Guys team and quite a few of them are significantly taller than we are, so everything had to be changed for the race. While a marshall was checking our boat to make sure that our shoes were tied down, the boys arrived! It is a really really really good thing that they came early to watch us boat because it was exceptionally windy when we were trying to take the boat out. Providing some hilarious pictures, we ended up having about 13 people holding our 8 while waiting for the other crews to boat.

When we were finally able to put our boat in the water and push off of the bank, it was game time. The weather wasn’t as cold as I had anticipated, which was a great relief. The paddle to the pink house where we had to marshall took a while, though I couldn’t give you the exact time because I was trying not to pay attention to the time! It was a bit difficult with the strength of the wind to get a clean stroke, so we were all trying to make sure that we could square our blades early enough and not get caught up by the wind. Our draw was 22 out of 23 for the first division, so we were the second to last crew to roll start. Once we got around the corner and made our turns and paddled up to the start line. For those of you that don’t know a lot about rowing, a head race has a rolling start, so you can power up to full face pace right before you cross the start line. We were down to our onesies and ready to go.

I can’t really tell you much about the race because I was focused on my stroke during the race, but there were a couple of points that are well worth mentioning. I am not quite sure how far we were into the race, but right before the first bridge our cox, Val, shouted, “Alright girls, only 1 and half boat lengths until we overtake this next crew!” I remember thinking that there was no way we could be overtaking a crew so early. About 15 strokes later another call from Val was, “1 boat length girls! Push harder!” The bit where we actually overtook the crew is somewhat of a blur because I was just too excited that we were in the process of going fast enough that we could overtake a crew. We managed to take the crew going around the bend and under the first bridge.

Andy caught the bit after the 2nd bridge while we were passing the boat house and you can watch it below!

We passed the boat house with cheers from our fellow LSE rowers and that was one of the best feelings I have ever experienced. It was really something else to be cheered on to get that extra push of power going through one of the last bits of the race course. We only had a bit left until we reached the finish at this point and we were making our final pushes ’till the end. As we passed the finish line, we knew that we did very well as a crew. Given that it was our very first race as a crew, my first race ever, our 7th time on the water as a crew, and my 6th time on the water ever, I would say it was an incredibly successful race.

The novice boys jumped in our boat right as we came up to shore to start the paddle to the pink house for their race at 3:30, so we didn’t have to carry the boat out of the water! This was fantastic because it started raining as we were paddling back and it would not have been very fun to put the boat back. The boys did well also! The Men’s Intermediate 8 came by the boat house first and we saw them overtake 2 crews! Then the Men’s Novice 8 came through and they overtook a crew right in front of the boat house, which gave me some epic photos.

Overall, it was a fantastic day for the LSE Rowing Club. We went to The Station House, a gastropub near the train station in Chiswick, after everyone was back from races and changed into dry clothes. It was fun having everyone in the same place at one time, as this does not generally happen. Everyone was anxious to see the results posted by the UH Head staff and you could tell that we didn’t need times to confirm that we all rowed well and had an amazing day.

We had to wait until this morning to see the results (you can see the full results here). Ultimately, the Experienced men overtook 3 crews and finished the 3,600 m course in 13:42, placing 4th out of 7 in the Men’s Senior VIIIs. The Novice men overtook 1 crew and finished in 15:04, placing 4th out of 7 in the Men’s Novice VIIIs. Us girls? Well, much to our excitement, we finished in 15:49 and placed 2nd out of 7 in the Women’s Novice VIIIs!

Second place?! We made the podium!!! I am so proud of my girls for how far we have come. On to Women’s Head of the River in 2 weeks!

I could write this tomorrow…

But there’s no time like the present. Many a great things have been happening over the past week and I will fill you in on what they are!

To start off, if you haven’t read my previous post about Blink-182 and how I won two tickets to any show on their European tour, you should probably check that out. That pretty much covers Thursday. Unfortunately the day came to a low point upon finding out that my Grandmother Patricia Chartrand passed away. She had been suffering from a very aggressive brain tumour and it had finally taken over. In a way, I’m glad that it came quickly so that she didn’t have to suffer through the pain but on the other hand, I wish she could have had a bit more coherent time with Grampy. Hopefully all will be well.

Friday wasn’t a very memorable day other than some lovely banter before Macroeconomics class with Caroline, Nikita and Tom. I made sure to have an early night because I was looking forward to a day of rowing on Saturday!

Which obviously brings us to Saturday. Having not been out on the water since the middle of Michaelmas term, it was pretty safe to say I was anxious to get out for some rowing. I woke up a bit early, got a little breakfast and then took the Tube from Southwark to Westminster and then to Turnham Green to meet up with the girls to take the bus to the boat house. After a while of waiting for one of the girls on our crew to show up, we decided to wait inside of the boat house instead of the in the rainy and windy exterior. Then we got the black 8+ out and the rain lifted up a bit. We have two crews set for this term. One crew is training for the Women’s Head of the River on March 3 and the other is training for a race we are doing in Toulouse, France called Supaerowing the weekend of March 9-11. I should be competing on both crews so I have two races to look forward to towards the end of Lent term! Though, if we feel we are prepared enough as the Head crew, we might be racing in the Hammersmith Head on February 19. I thought that I had a very good outing for it being only my second time on the water and I’m looking forward to rapidly improving. If you want to check out the video of our first outing as a set crew here’s the link. CLICK ME!

After our outing, Caroline and I went to Giraffe and boy is that restaurant delicious. We shared Huevos Rancheros and a Cheesebuger with Sweet Potato Fries. We are planning on going back there after our outings on Saturdays for the rest of rowing.

Which brings me to Sunday! And Sunday was a busy day. I woke up to do some work for Monday (hell day) and then made my way over to Hillsong London. Welcome Home. I love Hillsong London with such a passion. This week was my first week serving on the One27 team to make the packs with service information and provision envelopes with pens that go on the seats. Because we have Church in the Dominion Theatre that is usually host to the musical We Will Rock You, it poses a challenge to balance the packs on the arms of the theatre chairs, but I managed to catch the hang of it. After a couple of hours of serving it was time for the 18:00 service, which is widely known as the Young Adults populated service. I was so excited for this week because Pastor Brian Houston, the Head Pastor over all of Hillsong Church who generally lives in Sydney, Australia, was in London to speak to us! It was a great message, great worship, great people. Everything about Hillsong is amazing. If you’re looking for a Church to go to in London, Hillsong is definitely the place to be. If you’re not in London (as I assume most of you aren’t) Hillsong Sydney does a live feed and there are many podcasts that you can find on iTunes. So much love. I’m also really looking forward to Colour Conference in the end of April for the Sisterhood of the Church.

And now it is Monday; the most extravagant day of them all! I started the day off perfectly with scrambled eggs on toast and a cup of joe from Frank’s, which is around the corner from Bankside. I brought last week’s copy of The Economist with me and had a nice 20 minute breakfast session before heading over to Peacock Theatre for Macroeconomics lecture. I was early today, it was very interesting. After lecture, I had a meeting with the other heads of Women’s Rowing to make sure that we were all on the same page with racing and the running of the club. It was very productive. Then, I didn’t have my Research Methods lecture because my professor was ill! (Get well soon Jordi!) Class for Microeconomics followed and then I had lunch with Nikita in the 4th Floor Restaurant where we had Chinese food to celebrate the Chinese New Year! I will most likely go to some of the Chinese New Year festivities in Trafalgar Square this weekend if I have some spare time. After hanging out with Wisconsin (John) for a bit and returning some books from the Library I made my way to Old Gym to record the men’s Erg session times. 3 x 2000m! Some of them rowed in their racing onesies which is always entertaining. Jean pulled a 6:50.1 which was rather impressive for the Novice team. After my ritual of £3 Subway meals, I came back home to go to the gym and do our scheduled Erg session for the day which was titled by Vicky as the 30 minute “Ball-breaker”. And what a treat that was! The pain will be felt tomorrow from 3 sets of 4 minutes at a rate of 20 strokes per minute, 3 minutes rate 24, 2 minutes rate 26 and 1 minute rate 28. All for training and improvement. It will be worth it. It WILL be worth it. Especially when we race in the 7000m Head of the River.

I just realised that I didn’t even get to the best part of today. How silly of me to forget. I filled out an application a couple of weeks ago to be a part of a program called the Global Poverty Ambassadors of 2012. Many of you who know me personally know that I am a big supporter of non-profit organisations focused on human rights and the eradication of poverty. I have been campaigning for the ONE Campaign and Invisible Children for several years and continue to help out where I can. The Global Poverty Project, in conjunction with The Co-Operative, is an educational and campaigning organisation that activates citizens to be a part of the global movement to end extreme poverty. I found out this afternoon that I was selected to be a Global Poverty Ambassador! I will be training to deliver the 1.4 Billion Reasons presentation to places in my community and elsewhere. Expect a vlog with the presentation! Not only will I be able to take a step up in my campaigning to fight global poverty, but I will be attending the launch of the Global Poverty Ambassadors at the LSE on Wednesday. You might ask, why is this so exciting? Bill Gates has chosen the launch of the Global Poverty Ambassadors to deliver his Annual Letter! I am incredibly thrilled to be a part of this momentous occasion and you can be a part of it to! Of course, the launch itself is closed to members of the general public, but there will be a live stream of Mr. Gates’ presentation of the Annual Letter and the launch of the Global Poverty Ambassadors! You can watch it HERE on Wednesday January 25 at 13:30-14:30. For you east-coasters that would be 8:30-9:30. It will be an event that you do not want to miss. I assure you I will have an update immediately following the presentation. There are 75 Ambassadors in the first group for the year!

As for tomorrow, because I decided to write this and prolong going to bed (it’s now 2:00am), I will get close to 8 hours of sleep and wake up at 10. Being the lucky duck that I am, I don’t have class or lecture on Tuesday so I don’t have to worry about anything! But because I am in training I am going to go for a run in the morning and then head to Uni to go to Rowing circuits and then get some work done. I’m also going to start a new page on my blog titled, Things I Love About London. Does that sound cheesy? Maybe so, but it’s not going to be your average work of fancy for architecture and such. Stay tuned.

I have included several links throughout this post that can give you more information to the organisations that I am a part of or events that I am taking place in.

That’s all for now!
Update on Wednesday, FOR SURE.

I’m a happy camper.–Kerry