Regatta double time

Rowing fans won't soon forget the 2007 Royal St. John's Regatta, a day in which the men's record was broken twice and the top women's crew dominated its opposition.

The story of the day was without doubt the Crosbie Industrial Services men's crew, which won its second straight Regatta championship in style. Crosbie Industrial started things off by setting a new men's record in the morning, finishing the race in eight minutes and 54.06 seconds, beating the previous record of 8:57, set by the Butternut crew in 1997.

The Crosbie crew wasn't finished there, however, as it broke its own record later that night in the men's final, winning the race in a time of 8:51.32.

"We rowed 8:49 in practice last week and that's super fast ... We knew we had something special (coming into the Regatta)," said Crosbie Industrial's Eddie Williams.

Crosbie Industrial, which includes Williams, coxswain Mark Hayward, stroke Brent Hickey, Adam Kavanagh, James Cadigan, Darryl Ryan, Ron Whitten and coach Bert Hickey, had the support of nearly every onlooker at Quidi Vidi Lake during the final Thursday. Fans threw their arms in the air in celebration when the record was broken for the second time in one day and when coach Hickey walked through the crowd moments later, he was greeted with hugs and handshakes.

"I had six great guys who were willing to learn and listen," Hickey said of his team. "It's gratifying to see the amount of work these guys put into this and get so much out of it ... They worked like Trojans."

Exit Reality on the Rock took second place in the men's final, finishing in 9:00.78, a time that would have been good enough for first place in many other years.

Lamb's Rum finished third in 9:26.46, IKM Testing took fourth in 9:33.57 and Islander RV claimed fifth in 9:46.53.

The women's final was all about the O'Dea, Earle Law Offices crew, a team comprised of rowers who had won Regatta titles before, but never with each other before Thursday.

The O'Dea Earle crew of coxswain Ronnie Brennan, stroke Nicolle Hamlyn, Kate Parsons, Ashley Peach, Laura rice, Katie Wadden and Amanda Hancock won its first race of the day by more than 13 seconds before taking the championship race 5:06.16, a full 12 seconds ahead of the next best finisher. North Atlantic (5:18.27), Central Dairies (5:20.57), Target Ladies (5:21.47) and Totally Tanned 5:21.94 rounded out the top five in the women's category.



dmacrae@thetelegram.com