Lankaland oars

In a country where cricket is worshiped and rugby is a classy past time, many sports and sports persons are simply forgotten or neglected. No one can be blamed for this really, as there is no reason for investors to even take a second glance at these sports, simply because they don’t make enough money. Mostly because of the lack of spectators or the lack of potential for more spectators.

Among these, fall one of oldest and one of the most impressive sports in the world, rowing. Although the sport of rowing is still flying high in the international level it is still known only among a small group of Sri Lankan rowing enthusiasts. The popularity; which is already low, is sustained mainly because of school institutions rowing within the Colombo rowing club. With royal and St. Thomas’s being old members of the club, and of course schools such as Ananda college and St. Joseph’s college which has started rowing a while back. It has to be said that Ananda College has made great strides in the mere seven years that she has been rowing. Also the ladies schools such as Ladies College, Meauseus College, and more recently bishops college and vishaka vidyalaya. All these college crews and there followers are the main reason for the sport to have survived up to now in the country.

The prestigious Colombo-Madras regatta is scheduled to start off in a couple of weeks. This particular regatta is the world’s second oldest regatta after the world famous Oxford-Cambridge boat race. But it is very sad to imagine that not even five percent of the nation’s population is aware of this important fact. The most amazing fact in this year’s boat race is that the senior four which will indeed row the boat race is made up of juniors considering their age and club rank. The more senior four was beaten in trials by this amazing junior four which is made up of three thomians and an anandian.

The most crowd-pulling event in the Sri Lankan rowing calendar is the Royal- St. Thomas’s annual boat race. It is held mostly as a carnival these days with rowing enthusiasts and “happening” young teenagers alike finding their way into the Colombo rowing club to witness this event with such a long history. This boat race has been much fought for throughout the years.

Success in the international arena has been very limited for the oarsmen of Colombo as very little opportunities are available for them. Few oarsmen have won silver medals at SAF games and many other south Asian regattas’, but no one climbed further in terms of winning international acclaim. But you cannot forget the efforts of one oarsman who has done extremely well mainly through his dedication. This year he earned himself the opportunity to go for Olympic trials in Beijing as a sculler.

Any person who has seen a crew rowing down a river in their boats will agree with me, that it is one of the most beautiful sights any one can see. But it is not as easy as it looks for the crew that is working so hard to move that piece of heavy material down a lake (especially like the Beire Lake in Colombo). An oarsman requires sustaining both, mental and physical fitness at its best, to win, specially a high stakes boat race. As my coach used to say ‘Rowing is not a sport it’s an attitude’, every oarsmen will push off that pier with only one thing on their mind and that’s, thrashing all the other crews by a big margin. Coming second is simply not an option for these dedicated athletes. Most oarsmen in the Colombo rowing club go to school or have full time jobs, because rowing is not a professional sport in Sri Lanka. With all of that, they still show up for training seven days a week. Be it running, fitness, Gym, boat training, indoor rowing, or a pace-down the Colombo boys will give their 150% guarantied. Therefore it is sad to see, that that due support is not given to these dedicated and hardworking oarsmen and women of Sri Lanka