A local rower has spoken of her amazing experience competing at the World Rowing Coastal Championships in Hong Kong.

Bryony Jones, of Broadmoor, started rowing in 2006 at Wisemans Bridge Rowing Club, where she is still a member, but moved into coastal sculling around four years ago and has since competed at national and international events.

Bryony, who is currently a member of Llanion Warriors Rowing Club, but also has her own single scull, recently took part at the World Rowing Coastal Championships (WRCC) - an annual event open to FISA rowing countries.

“To enter the event we have to be ranked by British Rowing, and this is usually done by competing at the British Rowing Offshore Championships, however the event was cancelled this year due to strong winds,” explained Bryony on her involvement.

“Because of this, they based the rankings on the results of the last two years of WRCC and British Rowing Offshore events, and this year I was ranked as GBR01 which meant I qualified for the heats at the WRCC.”

Held over November 1 to 3, the event was based at the Royal Hong Kong Yacht Club and the race was held in Victoria Harbour.

“The harbour was very busy which made for very choppy conditions making the event very challenging,”?she continued.

“There were nearly 500 competitors from 27 countries at the event.

“I competed in both the ladies solo category and the mixed double category with Rick Rouille of Jersey Rowing Club, as GBR04.

“In the ladies solo heat I was ninth with the top eight in each of the two heats qualifying to the A final.

“I was disappointed to just miss out on the A final, but came first in the B final which was an amazing experience and placed me 17th overall.

“Myself and Rick had not rowed together prior to the event, so we were not expecting too much in the mixed doubles event; we did make the B final and came ninth, which placed us 25th overall.

“Overall it is was an amazing experience and has made me determined and excited to continue training and hopefully improve for next year’s event which is due to be held in Portugal in October 2020,” she added.

For more details of the event you can head to: www.WRCC2019.com