WORLD U23 gold medallist Robbie Prosser joined the nation’s top rowers at the GB 5km trials race in Boston at the weekend.

The Old Monmothian oarsman teamed up with fellow Bristol University rower Jake Birch to race the River Witham course, alongside the likes of double Olympic women’s champion Helen Glover and Tokyo Olympic medal Welsh rowing graduate Tom Barras.

Robbie won World U23 gold in the GB coxed four in a new world best age-group time last year in Varese, Italy, and added a bronze in the 8s at the European U23s in Belgium six weeks later.

This time, alongside GB’s Olympic and 2022 senior world medal stars, the going was even harder, with the nation’s men currently world champions in both eights and fours.

Racing in a 32-boat men’s pair field, Robbie and partner covered the course in 17 minutes 31 seconds, which placed them 22nd in a race won by 2022 world senior bronze medal pair Oli Wynne-Griffith and Tom George in 16.11.

World eights champions David Bewicke-Copley and Morgan Bolding were second in 16.20 followed by 2022 gold medal crew mates James Rudkin and Sholto Carnegie in 16.30.

Such was the level of competition, Robbie’s boat would have finished nine places higher if they had found another 18 seconds.

And although he is no longer eligible for U23, he’ll be targeting a seat in the FISU World University Championships in Canada in July.

Cardiff University graduate Barras, who won senior world singles bronze in 2017, won the 34-boat men’s singles trial by seven seconds from 2022 GB world silver quad medal crew mate George Bourne in 17.17.

Cardiff Metropolitan graduate Glover – the mum-of-three wife of TV naturalist Steve Backshall, who won London and Rio Olympic pairs gold under Old Monmothian coach Robin Williams – is still performing incredibly at the age of 36.

And she won the 25-boat women’s pairs race in Boston with 2022 world fours gold medallist Rebecca Shorten by eight seconds in 18.23 to go top of the GB pecking order for Paris 2024.

World women’s quads medallist Georgie Brayshaw won the 48-boat women’s singles race by 13 seconds from her 2022 crew mate Lola Anderson, crossing in 19.28.