Cleaned, painted, polished. This summer both our boathouse and the equipment in it was given Hollywood style cosmetic changes. Our head coach John Impey and Boathouse Manager Ruth Haigh manifested their Manchester worker bee origins by working tirelessly to get the MUBC shells, blades and changing rooms into pristine condition for our new novices and returning seniors. All senior blades have been checked and spruced up, whilst the new novice blades purchased from Oxford Brooks last year have been given Ruth’s seal of approval.
The shell focus was on small boats – as all coxes know, good things come in small packages. Singles, doubles and pairs were cleaned, with the Burgashell singles being re-taped white and blue to make us highly visible in the Manchester rain clouds. Persephone was also taken off the rack and dusted down for the first time in a year to be given some much needed TLC before our Novices had their first taste of rowing during the Freshers weekend.
Our colour coding was on point with white, purple and yellow freshening up the Boathouse and trestles. One of the more subtle changes however was the reusing of an old eight to make a beautiful flower bed that was of course, filled with purple and yellow flowers. Many of these changes will never be noticed by our new and returning rowers, however it has helped to make our Boathouse an even nicer place to spend a (rainy) weekend – watch this space for more improvements to come!