After a lost year and cancellation, St Neots Rowing Club were delighted to be able to stage their annual regatta - with crews travelling from across the country to take part.

The St Neots Regatta saw a total of 440 races over two days with some solid performances from the host club, finding time to race in between the long hours required to run the event.

Dominic Chapman and Fergus Mitchell-Dwelly had the most success, winning the open men’s pairs over both the 500m and 1,000m distance against strong opposition from Newark and Peterborough City.

After comfortable victories in both quarter-final and semi-final, juniors Ava Gisonni and Ciara Mantle, racing two years above her own age category, were just edged out by a length in the final of the J18 Doubles by Norwich.

Hannah Towns and William Hamlyn also reached the final of the mixed doubles having won a close-run semi-final against Cambridge ’99.

The event also provided many of the club’s members their first opportunity to race at a regatta since learning to row.

The crew of Tim Clifford, Ian Cunningham, Ryan Keating, Daniel Grimes and cox Lisl Tudor competed in the open men’s coxed fours, and enjoyed their first taste of success with a heat win over Lea Rowing Club.

Juniors Phoebe Hannah and Bella Moretto, who only started in the sport a few months ago, competed in the J14 doubles, winning their first heat easily before being knocked out by the eventual winners.

Club captain Ryan Keating said: “What a great weekend. I want to say a huge thank you to the regatta committee and our members for giving up their time to make it happen, and to everyone who came down to cheer us on.

"The atmosphere was fantastic and everyone was clearly happy to see the return of racing.

"I’m particularly proud of the performance of our junior squad. We’ve grown from just six juniors to more than 30 in the three months since we re-opened.

"To see so many of our new members get their first taste of racing was great and makes for a really exciting future.”

Anyone interested in rowing should email either learn@stneotsrc.co.uk for the senior section or juniors-coordinator@stneotsrc.co.uk

For more information about St Neots Rowing Club go to www.stneotsrc.co.uk