It was a right Royal historic regatta

Richard DWIGHT

Maalik Aziz, the captain of Royal College concluded his message in the souvenir by spurring his oarsmen saying “let us now row hard and achieve a right Royal Victory”.

He lived upto what he said, by translating his words of exhortation to deeds, when he along with his teammate overwhelmed the Thomian oarsmen to convincingly triumph over them in the 34th, Royal-Thomian Regatta held last Saturday at the Beira Lake.

The card of events as in the past years is confined to 6 races carrying points, which come into the reckoning for the overall trophy, for the champions.

The six races are Junior B Scull 2 points, Junior B Pair 4 pts; Junior A Scull 6 pts; Senior A Pair 8 points, Senior B Four 8 pts and Senior A Four 12 pts - making the maximum aggregate points available to 40 points.

At this 34th regatta, the oarsmen of Royal College achieved the near impossible of winning all 6 events to score the permissable maximum points for 40, to leave S. Thomas’ with no points at all.

Records reveal that a team has not won like this before, for it has been found, for the winning team to concede defeat in a race or two.

This unparalleled margin of victory by Royal is unique to be historic. The only time S. Thomas’ came close to this, was in the year 1983, when the Thomians won 5 races to Royal winning just one race to score 36 with Royal 4 pts.

The captain that year in 1983 for S. Thomas’ was S. Senarath and Royal was led by Asela Gunawardena and, it was fraught with significance for Asela to witness this Major Triumph by Royal as chief guest.

Of the 34 regattas held thus far S. Thomas’ have won 17 to Royals 14 with 3 regattas tied of the 38 boat races S. Thomas’ have won 20 and Royal 18.