S.Thomas College took the Gold beating rivals Royal by 0.12 sec in the first 8s Endurance Challenge at the Bolgoda lake last evening.
The under 19 category dominated by the school teams was a race against the time between the boys from Royal, Thomas and Asian International School (AIS) and Ananda College where the Thomian eight completed the race in the shortest time 41.03 seconds securing the first place, while Royal College came in second with 41.15 secs to AIS 42.20 seconds ending up with a bronze for their school. Ananda College also clocked in close behind at 42.50 seconds.
For the first time in Sri Lanka, the rowing enthusiasts were given the experience of witnessing the internationally famous ‘eights’ race in the Endurance Challenge 2015 worked off at the Bolgoda lake 25th and 26th July 2015.
Day 01 started off with the scull races for the ladies. The scull races covered a total of 6km as the view from Ranmal Hotel was picturesque with supporters cheering from the pier to encourage the oarsmen and oarswomen in the boats.
All the races for this regatta is a time based measure, where the timing is recorded for each boat to cover an allocated distance and the team that finished the race with the shortest time was announced the winner.
The ladies under 19 scull event was a time-try between the scullers from Musaeus College and Ladies College. These series of races were timed and Musaeus College scullers took home the Gold and Bronze medals while Ladies College sculler secured the Silver for their school.
The process followed for the open scull race was similar to the under 19 category, but the winners table was dominated by the forces. Sri Lanka Army sculler secured the first place while the scullers from Air force and Navy managed to obtain the second and third place respectively.
In contrast to the scull events by the ladies, the evening session for the men’s were on the boat containing eight men with the oars. The movement of the boat from the pier was a treat to watch. This race was longer than the scull event with 10km for the boat to travel along the Bolgoda lake. Even though the match did not provide the enthusiasm it gives to see two boats racing each other simultaneously, it was still a different scene for the Sri Lankan eyes.
Similar to the Ladies scull event, the open category was dominated by the men from the forces. Eight men from the Air force team had a better timing than the Navy team which came in second in the race. Army team with the longest timing out of the three forces fell into the third position, on conclusion of the events for the day.
At first light on the 26th July, it is expected to see the eight races inthe women’s category and scull events from the men’s category.
