Edwards delighted with Henley and World Cup successes

THE last couple of weeks could scarcely have gone any better for Rebecca Edwards.

The Aughnacloy woman achieved a long-held goal to win the Remenham Challenge Cup at Henley Royal Regatta as part of the Great Britain eight against Australia and she followed that up in Switzerland a week later when she was part of the GB team that were crowned World Cup champions.

That first win, at the world-renowned Royal Henley Regatta was particularly sweet for Edwards, who only took up the sport in 2013 when she went to study at Queen’s University in Belfast and ever since she first competed at that particular event on the Thames in 2016, she has longed to win the Remenham Challenge Cup.

“That was like a dream come true for me,” beamed the Tyrone woman, who competed for Team GB at the Tokyo Olympics last year.

She continued: “It’s a very different regatta to the racing you see on TV with six lanes. It’s on the river, one on one and because it’s so close to the banks, you have spectators the whole way along the 2,100 metres and when it’s your home turf, everyone is cheering for you, it’s really, really cool!

“People want to win the Olympics and Henley, it’s that sort of level in the rowing world!”

Buoyed by that success against a strongly fancied Australian team that included two Olympic gold medalists and a few other competitors from Tokyo, Edwards traveled to Switzerland for the final round of the World Cup.

“The team, overall, we won the World Cup so that was quite exciting,” beamed the former Royal School Dungannon pupil, who helped her ‘development’ four to a ninth place finish in Switzerland.

She added: “I was in what was sort of a development boat, with two new girls, and it was their first big event so it was good to be able to show them a good experience, to take the lead a wee bit, and it was class to be part of the World Cup win.”

After taking a short break from rowing, Edwards will turn her attentions to the European Championships in Munich, which take place in the middle of next month.