2021 saw the Cantabs women finish as the fastest women’s crew overall at Fairbairns, and the Cantabs men finish as the 3rd fastest men overall, an impressive result given both crews were in scratch combinations. The win meant that the Cantabs women won the invitational event for the 9th year in a row and were the fastest women overall for the 5th time in 6 years.
The last Friday of the Cambridge University term sees the Fairbairn Cup take place on the River Cam, a race for eights and fours for student crews which also has an ‘invitational’ category aimed at town clubs and college alumni. Each year, Cantabs enters a number of crews to Fairbairns, though usually of unusual line-ups compared to normal as the race takes place during office hours.
This year, 5 Cantabs crews were able to race: 1 from the Senior Men, 2 from the Senior Women, 1 from the Aquaphobes, with the Harlequins competing for the first time. The Aquaphobes raced well and enjoyed a personal best time for the course, finishing as the 23rd fastest crew overall. This was a good race for the masters crew, who have recently raced both locally and in Belfast.
Fielding a new combination for the first time, the Senior Men closed a substantial gap to the Rob Roy/Lysander crew starting ahead of them to finish as the 3rd fastest men’s crew overall.
Elsewhere, the Senior Women fielded two eights for the first time, entering two ‘on paper’ scratch matched crews for the event. Each crew contained a combination of athletes reasonably new to the sport and squad, masters athletes, and members of the 8+ which pre-qualified for Henley Royal Regatta last season and recent Scullers Head winners. The crew which gelled together best on the day finished as the fastest women’s crew overall, winning the women’s invitational event for the 9th year in a row. This year also marked their 5th overall win in 6 years, only previously beaten in 2018 by a CUBC crew.
Cantabs members raced in various college and alumni crews, including Becca Hatton winning the Women’s Invitational 4+ with fellow Downing College alumni.
If you’re interested in finding out more about rowing with Cantabs, please contact the men’s captain or women’s captain for more information.
