Saturday October 5th was the day for this year’s Rhine Marathon, which is rowed from the RHTC Bayer Leverkusen club downstream over 26.2 miles of river to the Ruderclub Germania Düsseldorf 1904, located in the suburb of Hamm. This was the 11th consecutive year the current “squad” of late 1970s vintage Billygoats has tackled the course, happily doing so this time in good conditions and with a decent if unspectacular performance – timed at 2 hours and 44 minutes.
We again rowed as a coxed quad in a class D river boat (the “Elbe”) provided by our host club, Germania Düsseldorf, with club member Wolfgang once again sitting at cox. Wolfgang has surely qualified as an honorary Billygoat by now, with 10 years served as a crew member. This year saw us scrambling to mobilize the usual squad, with age, health issues and family events conspiring to leave us short of two oarsmen late in the build-up. In stepped two Aberdeen Boat Club veterans well known to Neil G (also an ABC member) to save the day, and thus we rowed as an Aberdeen BC/ Billygoats Cambridge composite crew for the first time.
Above: The crew outside Ruderclub Germania Düsseldorf – Ron (ABC), Neil (BG), Jim (ABC) and Clive (BG)
On Friday evening we enjoyed the dinner for visiting clubs hosted by Germania Düsseldorf, taking care not to overdose on the local delicacy of Schweinhaxe (Pork Knuckle) or the dark Alt beer. Saturday we had an early start by virtue of being at the older end of the age categories, having to make the 7:00am bus down to the start in Leverkusen to rig our boat and prep it for the marathon ahead.
Above: the scene at RHTC Bayer Leverkusen before the start. 169 boats completed the course.
Above: The “Elbe” and her crew ready to get going!
Above: Time for at least one selfie!
With an hour or so to get ready down at the start, we rigged the boat, taped up the riggers to minimize wave in-spill, installed our battery bilge pump and a GoPro on a tripod behind the cox, loaded up with water, gels and energy bars, and set-off at an elegant 20+ spm down the river. The water level on the Rhine is exceedingly low this year due to lack of rainfall, so the current was a little slower than usual and we expected a lot of rough water due to the narrower river and the ever present large barge traffic.
In the event we experienced less barge traffic than usual and made pretty good progress due to the better conditions, not losing as much time to the experienced Rhine crews who know how to deal with rough water better than those of us who see it once a year! We stopped briefly on the water 3 or 4 times for water and energy replenishment and covered the course at a relatively even pace all the way to the finish.
No prizes won, we were 4th of 4 boats in our Masters G category, however 2 ½ minutes faster would have placed us in second position, so we were quite encouraged with this as a scratch crew with two members absolutely new to the Rhine.
Above: GoPro camera still from early in the race.
This year our weekend was brilliantly and almost fully documented in images by Ron Wallace, aka Snapper Ron, who gets the credit for all the pictures in this article (except the selfie) and who has posted the event online at the following address:
http://cofd.co.uk/images/Rhine%20Marathon%202019/Rhine2019.html
The GoPro footage has been edited down into a very amusing 2 ½ minutes movie which is well worth watching even if you have no rowing experience – look for the tile which identifies within its contents the GoPro footage and play it. It starts with a stills slide show and then takes you into the race footage. Enjoy it without the pain and the effort!
Once again a huge thanks to our German hosts for their warm hospitality and for their ability to organize such a great event so smoothly. Health and fitness allowing we will keep the tradition going in 2020!
Neil Gardner (1977)