Over the October half-term break, nine of our rowers and two coaches set off for Boston, USA, to compete in the Head of the Charles Regatta – the largest headrace in the world, which attracts tens of thousands of spectators. We left Heathrow at 4:55 pm and arrived at our respective families houses at 4:00 am our time. Needless to say, we went straight to sleep and prepared for the days ahead.

On Thursday morning, we regrouped at Belmont Hill School and travelled over to Northeastern University boathouse where we met Old Blue Alex Gass, who is studying at Northeastern.  Along with learning the course and gaining crew practice, Thursday and Friday gave us a chance to experience American culture by visiting restaurants and spending time with our host families.

On Saturday we travelled to the Harvard boathouse where we were lucky enough to have our Headmaster as the tour guide. It was great to see pictures of when he rowed for Harvard. The boathouse alone was enough to leave us amazed and the rest of the campus was everything we expected and more. We learned about the history of the university, and why not to touch Jon Harvard’s foot, and went souvenir hunting in the campus clothing store.

Sunday marked the race day and it brought very strong winds, much to our despair; the course itself is challenging enough without a 30 mph headwind. We rowed up to the start in the freezing cold where we waited, trying our best not to sink in the somewhat coastal conditions. At 12:43, we built for the line very enthusiastically, but a few short moments later, when we turned around the corner, our enthusiasm faded as we felt the full force of the wind. I am very happy with how we raced, especially in the challenging conditions.

We left Boston on Monday 24th, following an impromptu mile-long jog with luggage through downtown to just make our train to New York.  After checking into our hotel, we went out and about sightseeing. Our first stop was Ground Zero – the 9/11 disaster memorial site; as you can imagine, this was a humbling experience. This was followed by a trip up the Freedom Tower, the tallest building in the western hemisphere, in time for the sunset over Manhattan.

On Tuesday morning, we had time for a run around Central Park, followed by one last breakfast in a typical American diner. Then it was time to negotiate the New York metro system to JFK airport for the overnight flight back to the UK.

Our hosts in Boston could not have welcomed us better in their fantastic homes, and provided us with everything we could need. Amongst the many highlights were seeing The Great 8 with two-time Olympic Champion Mahe Drysdale row past, and listening to Tom Lightning questioning our existence on this planet, as well as visiting all the attractions in New York.

Big thanks to Belmont Hill School and Northeastern University for hosting us and lending us the boat and blades that we needed to compete. We would like to thank Mr Edmondson, Mr Stuart and Mr Elzinga for organising the trip and of course for cheering us on.  This was a trip that will be remembered by us all for a very long time.

– Ben Grainger, Year 13