Hello to all our boat rowers and welcome to the new season. A lot has happened during this off season that has kept your committee pretty busy so let's try to bring you all up to date.
ASRL Open:
We were originally set down for Dixon Park (Newcastle) but after taking advice it was decided that the beach conditions could be too risky to stay at that venue. Instead of mucking around we made the early call to shift and as we were already well committed into the Newcastle Shire we settled on Stockton as the venue. Organisation is progressing well under the stewardship of Frank Veltman who has been appointed as Race Director. We are extremely lucky to have Rhonda Scruton the CEO of Hunter Branch, the staff at Newcastle Shire and a great like Stockton to help make this event happen. Frank will be providing regular Open updates via the website and Newcastle have provided a website linking you to accommodation properties. The City of Newcastle will be doing everything possible to provide extra Ferry services to all a majority of people to stay in Newcastle proper with easy, regular and quick Ferry access to Stockton beach. This will include a shuttle bus service from the Ferry to the Beach and back.
Sponsors:
We have Navy on board with us again which has been a massive boost in assisting in the development of our sport around the country. We will again be running Navy Series events in every State bar the NT that will lead crews into representative honours at the ASRL Open. HSM has been very successful in further developing second tier sponsors that you will notice being highlighted on our website. Please where ever possible support all sponsors and don't be afraid to walk up to their representatives and say thank you, a little recognition is noticed and goes a long way.
Surf Boat Committee:
Some discussion has taken place around the establishment of the National Surf Boat Committee reporting directly to the Director of Surf Sports and the Surf Sports Committee of SLSA. When the ASRL was first formed it was felt by a section of boat competitors that the surf boat section was being left behind. This group set about developing surf boat competition sometimes in direct competition or conflict with the general SLS business. Happily much has been achieved over the years to the point where the ASRL was approached by SLSA some 18 months ago to form a new committee representing all boat rowers regardless of their affiliation with the ASRL. This process took some time to get right as both parties lobbied to find the best possible outcome.
Agreement was reached a couple of months ago and the first meeting of the new committee has been held. The charter is basically to be the voice of the surf boat section, we will be making recommendations back to SLSA as their appointed committee so in other words advising from inside the tent. This is a far stronger position for the ASRL to be in as the full committee of the ASRL also form the full committee of the SBC with the President of the ASRL as Chair of the new SBC.
To give an indication of what has already been achieved with the full cooperation of all parties:
- The National Interstate Championship event normally held as part of the all discipline Interstate event with only Open Men & Women's crews involved has now been agreed to be held at the ASRL Open on the Friday night
- This will now include all 6 divisions of racing plus the full Relay so crews selected to represent will all be recognised as full blown State representatives
- The selection process has changed to include both the State SLS selectors and your State rowing body. Your Navy Series in each State will be included into the selection process so the best performing crews will have every chance of being selected
- The ASRL will for the large part fund the Interstate Championship through the Navy involvement with travel and gear subsidies to all crews which is a massive improvement on what happened in the past for the National Interstate crews
- The Northern Territory is included in this event but must have at least 2 NT based crews before they will be allowed to draft outside crews
- We are in talks with both SLSA & SLSNZ for the introduction of a full blown Test Match event each year alternating between Australia and New Zealand. This is being discussed favourably by both associations and while it won't happen this year we are pretty confident it will happen. The plan is to recognise both senior Men and Women's in the Test match initially and to see if an age division may be added in the future.
- For this season the ASRL will be going ahead with the Battle of the Ditch in senior Men & Women's divisions to be held as a feature at the ASRL Open so something for our top crews to aim at. The two Australian crews will be the winners of the Interstate Championship event to be held on the Friday night at the Open
- The ASRL committee has asked that this committee make up the Boat Panel at the National Championships. The thought is that if we are to take on all this responsibility we should place ourselves in the position to be the chief advisor
- In our survey after the last Australian Championship you answered very clearly that you wanted to be part of the main event at the Aussies. Many of us feel that we have lost the Amphitheatre atmosphere for our finals and that our finalists aren't receiving the recognition they deserve. To this end we have been successful in having all finals now moved back onto the Sunday Championship Day. Finals will be staggered in time to allow each division to be properly introduced to the crowd
- We are in discussion with SLSA to have one of the main arenas made available to us from close of business on the Saturday afternoon so we can make sure we have a good set of cans to race with on Sunday. If we can make this work it will place boats in a very prominent beach position
Your committee members can be found here so as always if you want to ask a question we will all try to provide the answer.
Have a great season of competition and above all else enjoyment.
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