Sechser and Koszyk lead US charge at Head of the Charles

The USA took some of the top trophies at the Head of the Charles Regatta over the weekend, making sure the men’s and women’s championship eights and singles prizes stayed at home.

Over a weekend where Boston showed off both its best fall weather – and its worst, with torrential rain on Saturday and a blustery headwind on Sunday – the racing was fierce and fast, with plenty of clashes for the thousands of spectators on the bank.

All eyes turned to the championship single sculls on Friday, with plenty of international experience among the entrants. In the men’s race the USA’s Sorin Koszyk, racing for California Rowing Club, sculled a well-judged race to take the win after starting seventh. Koszyk set a course record of 16:57.78 seconds, smashing Andrew Campbell’s nine-year-old record by over 13 seconds.

New Zealand’s World bronze medallist Tom Mackintosh was second, almost 23 seconds back.

USA lightweight sculler Michelle Sechser, racing for local club Cambridge Boat Club, had a closer race with her Kiwi opposition, Emma Twigg. At the last intermediate timing marker Sechser was only half a second ahead of Twigg but a blistering finish gave her the win by four seconds. The 2022 champion, Emily Kallfelz, was third.

Sechser said afterwards: “That was a lot of fun. Every time I get to go up against these huge women with these incredible erg scores I’m just like ‘how am I going to beat them?’ Then I just close my eyes and row as hard as I can.”

Sechser and Koszyk both took home US$10 000 for their achievements, with Twigg and Mackintosh winning $5 000 and Kallfelz and men’s third-placed sculler Eliot Putnam $2 500 each.

It was a close-run thing for the World Rowing Championship silver medallists in the women’s championship eights, as they snatched victory by 0.215 seconds ahead of another USA squad boat. Denmark were third, with the Leander Club crew from the UK fourth.

The USA were also first in men’s championship eights, ahead of Harvard and Princeton Universities, with Leander fourth again.

The ‘Pink Palace’ did take the men’s championship double sculls title, with Oliver Costly and Rory Harris edging out the composite crew of Monaco’s Quentin Antognelli and the USA’s Jamie Copus.

The men’s youth eights is always a hotly contested event, and this year the prize goes back to the UK with a 20-second win for St Paul’s School, who started 74th but avoided mishap to beat Saugatuck Rowing Club into second.

Row America Rye ‘A’ had a similar winning margin in the women’s youth eights ahead of Greenwich Crew.

As well as the men’s championship singles record, a number of other records did fall this year. College Club Seattle set records in both the women’s senior master double sculls and men’s grand master double sculls, and Cambridge BC’s Greg Benning continues to set the standard in veteran sculling, smashing his own record set last year in the men’s veteran single sculls by 11 seconds.