New venues for Concept 2 rowing championships

Concept 2 has introduced Newark and Cambridge as new venues to its 2003/2004 British Indoor Rowing Grand Prix series.

Bringing the total to six regional Indoor Rowing Championships. Newark will stage the first race of the championship in October, followed by Portsmouth, Cardiff, Cambridge, Manchester and Nottingham.

Rowing competitors will also face the added challenge of new distances. As well as the Olympic Regatta distance of 2,000m, a 2,500m distance has been introduced as well as the one mile.

Concept 2’s head of marketing, John Wilson, says: “Some people record better times by doing a sprint row whereas others prefer the longer distances. The new race distances reflect this, plus we also wanted to add variety to the series.”

There are seven age categories for lightweight and heavyweight athletes. Up to 15 points will be awarded per event depending on the finishing position, with the top four scores counting towards the overall grand Prix result, this means one event’s bad performance will not effect the overall score.