The Dunstan Arms rowing club had a weekend to remember at Lake Ruataniwha.
Its squad of 38 accounted for 16 of Otago's 56 medals at the South Island rowing championships, held on Saturday and Sunday. The championships were the first of the season at which conditions allowed racing through to the end, giving many clubs their first idea of how they were going.
Dunstan Arms coach and rower Simon Smith said they were pleased to find they compared favourably.
``We're happy with where we're at,'' he said.
``[We're] looking forward to Maadi later in the year and nationals in two weeks' time, with my senior crew. We were pleasantly surprised with not knowing where we were [before the weekend's racing] and not knowing where the rest of the competition was. We were pretty happy to come away with those results.''
While the club achieved well across the board, its under-15 crews were particularly dominant. In the girls octuple sculls, the club finished in 4min 14.18sec, 37sec ahead of its nearest competitor. Likewise it claimed victory in the quadruple sculls and finished second in the double sculls.
In the same grade its boys crews finished second in the octuple and quadruple sculls.
Others to impress were Macaela Turfus and Stella Blake. The lightweight duo won gold in the heavyweight women's under-19 double sculls and were part of the winning quadruple sculls crew. Blake also came third in the single sculls.
Smith had a good regatta himself, winning the men's club double sculls alongside Greg McLaughlin and finishing second in the men's club single sculls. The duo were hoping to go to the World Masters Games in April.
He said the club had a good environment, although he was not sure if there was one reason in particular it had been so successful over the weekend.
``We just run a really strong programme. We run it as a group squad. It's not segregated, so the seniors and juniors all mix. It's been built up over the last six or seven seasons of how we've coached,'' Smith said.
``It just seems to keep growing every year. It keeps getting slightly better with what we're doing and how we're doing it. We're right into using our octuples for teaching our juniors with our seniors. We have a great competitive environment which seems to be pumping out good wee athletes.''
Meanwhile the Wanaka Rowing Club took home five medals, with Sam Pearce and Greer Porter claiming silvers in the boys and girls under-16 single sculls.
The Otago Rowing Club accounted for six medals, with four being gold, while Columba College won one gold in their four medals.
The North End club won six medals, while the Oamaru club won five and the Cromwell club won two.
