Jeppe rowing team performs well at the Gauteng championship
It was Jeppe’s finest performance ever at a Gauteng Championships, earning the biggest ever points total.
The Gauteng Schools Rowing Championship was held at Roodeplaat recently and despite the pressure of exams, the Jeppe oarsmen worked hard in the build-up and did well on all three days of the championship.
Next year’s Grade Eights, making up the u-14 age group, in their first-ever provincial championships, were excellent.
Sean Stork won a bronze medal in the u-14 single scull before teaming up with Horatio Dobson to win gold in the u-14 double.
The u-15 age group picked up where they left off at South Africa schools in March.
Mandla Green and Blayde Franken won gold and bronze in the single sculls, while Jeppe took the gold in the quad and silver in the octuple.
The u-16s raced over 2 000m for the first time at these championships and adapted very quickly.
Joshua Gillespie won gold in the single scull, while Darian Ferreira and Dustin Pierdica won silver in the pair.
The u-16 boys took bronze in the eight and silver in the quad.
The u-19s focused on the smaller boats for this half of the season and reaped the rewards of that decision.
On Friday, Nicholas Bonthuys won bronze in the single scull in his first year as an open rower, while Cameron De Araujo and Connor Brinkman and Aiden Buck and Michael Goncalves pushed each other all the way to the line and won silver and bronze, respectively, in the pairs.
The u-19s won silver in both the coxed four and the quad and silver in the double.
It was Jeppe’s finest performance ever at a Gauteng Championships, earning the biggest ever points total.
The club finished second overall for the first time since 2002, the top state school by some margin.
Jeppe’s achievements included:
The only school to medal in all four single sculls age groups, and in both the u-16 and u-19 pairs.
Jeppe qualified for the most finals and earned the most medals.
Jeppe qualified for 17 finals in the 19 events entered and earned 16 medals.
The junior age groups will now enjoy some well-earned time off, while the seniors prepare for a boat race in Port Alfred in December, before school resumes next year and all attention will be on the South African Schools Championships in March.
