Peterborough, ON - On Saturday, October 3 at the Head of the Trent Regatta, the Gryphons Varsity Rowing team produced some of their best results at this prestigious event in several years.
 
The day started off on a very strong note when third year captain Olivia Shotyk placed 3^rd in a very competitive Heavyweight Women's Single category. Over a 5km race, Olivia finished 1min behind first place and 15 seconds behind second.
 
The next Guelph boat to cross the finish line was the Heavyweight Men's 4+ (4^th year captain Lukas Hilgendag, Alex Boland, Matthew Larter, Justin Salvucci and coxswain Katherine de Klerk). In another highly competitive field, the Heavy Men's 4+ finished in 6^th, less than 0.1seconds off of 5^th.
 
Next to race was the JV Men's 2x, racing in the varsity heavyweight category. First years Jacob DeVries and Aiden Hickie-Bentzen had a great race and finished 6^th overall.
 
The Lightweight Men's 2x was the last Guelph Varsity Boat to race in Division 2 and Gregory Hanta and Myles Cameron did not disappoint! Their dedicated training this winter and the time they logged in their this summer paid off with a 3^rd place finish.
 
A Guelph Alumni Women's 8+ also rowed in Division 2. Morgan Brown (Class of 2013), Tani Weber (Class of 2013), Amy McClure (Class of 2014), Rachael Kearns (Class of 2015), Kerith Gordon (Class of 2012), Teresa Reitz (Class of 2013), Ariel Lenske (Class of 2014), Courtney Kiss (Class of 2010) and cox Nicole Gough (Class of 2011) placed 8^th in a co-ed field.
 
Next up for Guelph was the Heavyweight Women's 4+ of Ainsleigh Hennig (coxswain), Zyra Edwards, Megan Kamachi, Kerin Hudson and Erika Schwass. After a strong race through increasingly windy conditions the Heavyweight Women's 4+ posted a very strong second half to finish 4^th overall, just 3 seconds behind 3^rd.
 
The Lightweight Women's 4+ (Sarah Kassenaar, Emily Walsh, Chantal Dzisiak, Claire Benwood and coxswain Rachel Keirstad) also had a very strong second half of the race to finish 8^th overall.
 
The JV Women's 2x (Ashley Hosker and Rachel Malcove) raced in the Heavyweight Women's 2x category and finished 10^th, 2 seconds off of 9^th.
 
The last varsity race was the best result of the day. Lightweight Women's 2x of Kaitlyn Dennis and Sarah Vantfoort finished 2^nd.
 
Guelph's Novice Men's 8+ finished 9^th in a field that saw only 20 seconds separate 3^rd to 9^th place. Novice Heavyweight Women finished 8^th while the lightweight women DNF.
From Oct 8-10 Gregory Hanta (U23LM1x), Olivia Shotyk (U23W1x) and Sarah Vantfoort (JrW1x) will be competing with Team Ontario at the National Rowing Championships in Port Dalhousie, St. Catherines. The rest of the team will have Thanksgiving weekend off from racing.