Across The Line: Brits dominate the SilverSkiff as juniors flock to Boston
Your weekly roundup of all the racing action across the UK and around Europe
We’re Across The Line! Join us to look back on a molto bene weekend of rowing from Turin to Boston, and everything else!
Five wins for British Scullers at the 2025 SilverSkiff
A quintet of scullers returned back to British sculls after lighting up Turin at the 34th SilverSkiff on the River Po. The SilverSkiff is one of Italy’s most prestigious events and welcomed athletes from 26 countries. The 11 kilometre course is one of the most gruelling tests for scullers and involves a 180 degree turn at the halfway marker.
After winning silver in the Women’s Single Scull at the World Championships in Shanghai, Lauren Henry was the fastest woman beating Olympic silver medallist Roos de Jong by 50s. Henry was one of 70 British scullers who made the trip to northwest Italy part of a wider field of 662 scullers. Fresh from duking it out at Wingfield Sculls, Newark RC’s Jen Titterington won the Women’s Masters A event ahead of Norwich RC’s Mirella McGee who also made the trip to Italy. Newark RC sent one of the largest squads from the UK with 19 scullers contesting this year’s race and Graham Price placed third in the Men’s Master G event.
There was further success for the midlands as Nottingham RC won the Men’s Masters C event. David Smith blasted to victory ahead of 25 other scullers, including Paul Brewster who was representing Swiss club SN Geneve and finished second. There was another British 1-2 in the Men’s Master I Single Single Scull. Upper Thames RC’s Rod Stewart had hot legs and sailed to victory beating Quintin BC’s Tom Bishop into second place.
Clydesdale ARC’s Ben Parsonage had a huge amount of success in Belgium last year and this season, his European escapades brought him gold in the Lightweight Men’s event. The Scot was 13th overall and less than two minutes behind overall winner, Croatia’s triple Olympic champion Martin Sinković.
Speaking after his triumphant performance, Parsonage said, “The SilverSkiff is such a unique event with a wonderful atmosphere, it’s a great privilege to be able to come and race here. I didn’t think a win was on the cards for me this time so I’m absolutely thrilled to come away with the gold. Massive thanks to my coaches Chris and Peter as well as the superb YouRow Logistics team, without whom it wouldn’t have happened.”
Across the rest of racing, there were plenty of exceptional performances from the Brits. Crabtree’s Nathan O’Reilly was second in Men’s Masters B just ahead of Kingston RC’s Sylvian Boyer, while Marlow RC’s Jacqueline Easton was second in Women’s Master’s F. There were another couple of silver medals to be added to hand luggage for the flights home as Heidi Taylor and Christina Straughan-Parsons won silver in the Women’s U23 Lightweight and Women’s Masters H, respectively. Rounding off the British success was Weybridge RC’s Rachel Kornberg who placed third in a field of 11 other scullers for the Women’s Masters G event.
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All roads lead to Boston
218 junior scullers made the trip to Boston for the 2025 Boston Junior Sculling Head. This year’s event featured some of the top scullers in the country across J16, J17, and J18 racing the infamous 5000m course. This event was a GB Rowing Team U19 autumn benchmarking event and as such, plenty of scullers took this opportunity to lay down a serious marker early on in the season.
Credit: AllMarkOne
Wallingford RC sent a group of 10 athletes to Lincolnshire and it was England international Naomi Bell who was crowned fastest female sculler of the day. Three scullers were separated by 1.3s making up second, third, fourth. Shiplake College RC’s Alice Dargue was best of this chasing pack proving she can scull and sweep, having stroked Shiplake to an historic gold in Championship Eights at this year’s National Schools’ Regatta. Just behind her were Sir William Borlase’s Grammar School BC’s Amy Clarke and Headington School BC’s Elayna Yap.
On the Open side of things, Norwich School claimed the top spot in the the School/Junior Single Scull. Nicholas Conway was fastest sculler on the day, six seconds ahead of Joey Hill, who’s recently returned from Boston where he won Men’s Youth Quads with The Windsor Boys’ School BC. Mark Wilkinson’s boys also placed third, sixth, seventh, and tenth in the overall standings.
Westminster School BC and Headington School BC won the respective J17 events while Kings College School BC and Sir William Perkins’s School RC won the respective J16 events.
Credit: AllMarkOne
“I feel very proud to put a medal on the scoreboard for Great Britain”
The GB Rowing Team end World Rowing Beach Sprint Finals 2025 with a medal of each colour!
This year the Inclusion Mixed double sculls (INMix2x) is recognised as a World Champion event. 2024 defending champion Colin Wallace, and new partner Megan Hewison breezed through their semi final to set up a gold medal race against Egypt. It was another classy race. Megan was first to the boat in the sprint and they kept the lead to become the first ever World Champions in this event.
Colin said: “It feels incredible to be an official World Champion. It’s just amazing. Sharing the start line with some inspirational, incredible people, is just unbelievable. I hope that this inspires more people to get involved in Para Rowing and that more Para Beach events will be introduced.”
Megan added: “This has been such a good experience and I’m very happy to have helped Colin become World Champion. I really enjoyed racing today!”
Check out last week’s results
- Durham LDS (Northern Long Distance Sculling Series) & Small Boats Head
- Kingston SBH
- Cambridge Winter Head
- Inverness Heads
- Docklands SBH
- Northwich Autumn Head
Marlow RC: A case study on how to grow an adaptive squad
Marlow RC’s Bruce Lynn chats to Fergus Mainland all about how the adaptive squad has flourished over recent years and what lessons other clubs can take inspiration from
Social Spotlight: Guess who did what sport before talent testing for rowing
Athletes join the GB Performance Development Academies from all different sports – then our coaches develop them into rowers with Olympic potential!
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That’s all from Across The Line this week!
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