THERE was mixed luck for former Abingdon School pupils at the World Championships in Florida, writes John Wiggins.

Fifteen A finals were reached by the Great Britain team from which came one gold, three silver and three bronze medals.

A further three boats won their B finals, ranking seventh overall.

One of these was the men’s eight, who were without former Abingdon schoolboy and Oxford Blue, Ollie Cook, due to illness.

Another Abingdonian, Matt Rossiter, was in the four alongside Oxford Brookes rower Matt Tarrant and Leander’s Will Satch, which came home with bronze.

But they only achieved this after calling up former Radley College rower Oliver Wynne-Griffith to sub in to the stroke seat to cover for another illness in the semi-final.

Jamie Copus (Abingdon School and Brookes) finished tenth overall in the lightweight double.

Former Brookes student, Peter Chambers added silver to his collection of medals with a scintillating race in the lightweight quad, while the Wallingford duo of Ellie Piggott and Gemma Hall were fifth in the women’s lightweight quad.

The one gold medal came in spectacular style for the mixed LTA paralympic class four, which was formed only eight weeks ago and steered by former Oxford University lightweight cox, Anna Corderoy.

With a winning margin of 23 seconds, they smashed the world record.

In a thrilling close to the regatta, the women’s eight with Dark Blue Anastasia Chitty, Headingtonian Fiona Gammond and Brookes’ Katherine Douglas, finished fifth, just four seconds behind the Romanian gold medal boat.

A finals were achieved by Radlean Tom George’s pair finishing fifth while Harry Brightmore (Oxford Brookes) steered the coxed pair to fourth, the same place as the lightweight pair with another Brookes man, Joel Cassells.

l Wallingford RC took advantage of the home water to win across the board, when they hosted the Long Distance Sculls, raced in a revised format with two 4.25km divisions and a shorter 1.5km event for youngsters.

The club won the boys and girls J15 coxed quads and the 70-plus single category with Sean Morris.

Jenny Taylor took the masters D single, while quad events were won by masters C women, the men’s masters E crew and the J16 boys (with Abingdon RC second). Kat Butler and Leigh-Ann Bard claimed the open women’s double.

Headington School took the top two places in the senior women’s quad, and four of the top five places in the J14 singles,won by Biba Klic.