In-form City of Oxford RC returned from the National Championships in Stra-thclyde with seven sets of medals around their necks, writes MIKE ROSEWELL.

And these successes led to four City crews being selected to represent England in the Home Countries International in Cork this weekend.

Suzy Drohan, Oxford’s habitual trophy-winning cox, who ret-urned with a silver and a bronze medal, summed it up neatly, ‘CORC for CORK’.

The club’s medal haul consisted of four golds, one silver and two bronze, all courtesy of their women members, except for young Reece Taylor who took the gold in the Men’s Junior 15 Singles final Oxford’s women, particularly the youngsters, took the regatta by storm.

A gold came in the junior coxed four from Sian Morgan, Chloe Seal, Holly Holden, Cloudy Carnegie and Floss Smith.

And the same crew, with Shannon King replacing Holden, took the gold in the junior coxless fours.

This earned them the selection for England, as did the bronze achieved by Morgan and Carn-egie in the junior pairs, and the gold won by Keren Ward and Nicola Smith in the Women’s Senior Pairs.

Ward and Smith were not the only successes for Oxford’s more mature women.

Their coxed four of Isabel Unwin, Ingrid Gjorv, Jane Loveday, Sian Findlay and Drohan took a bronze.

And, joined by the winning pair and Melanie Ward and Katerina Uhl, they became the national club champions when they finished second in the championship eights.

The only crew ahead of them were a seven-club composite, with Headington School girls involved.

This weekend sees the World Under 23 Championships in Belarus, where four rowers from Oxford Brookes and one from Wallingford, are in the 12-crew British team.