IT was high fives all round as Wye rowers headed out to sea at the 135-year-old Penarth Regatta.

An assortment of Monmouth Rowing Club juniors and masters took five of the eight quadruple scull titles on offer to finish most successful club at Wales’ oldest rowing event.

Racing half a mile along the foreshore to the yacht club in beautiful sunshine, and overlooked by the newly-revamped pier, conditions were somewhat calmer than normal, allowing good technique to rise to the fore in the wider seagoing boats, as 48 boats launched out.

Kirsten Challis, Naomi Clarke, James Allot-Davey, Tom Dean and cox Aaron Davies got the ball rolling for the Monmouthshire Building Society-sponsored club with a mixed junior victory over Hereford by one and a half lengths, aided and abetted by their opponents’ bowman losing his blade, followed by Penarth in third.

And rowing underneath the cliffs from where Marconi sent the first radio signal across the sea, to Flatholm Island, in 1897, Clarke and Challis again, plus Helen Taylor, Alicia Brown and cox Patricia Carswell proved they were on the same wavelength to cruise to the women’s open title by a four length margin from Penarth and Cardiff City.

Just for good measure, the same crew then took the junior girls’ quads by a similar distance from two of the hosts’ boats, as Clarke and Challis secured personal hat-tricks.

Juniors Ieaun Griffiths and Aaron Davies teamed up with seniors Tom Penny and Nick Hartland, plus cox Tom Deans, in the men’s quads to beat City of Swansea in their opening heat.

And facing a strong City of Cardiff quad in the final, 2010 British quad champion Penny took his crew off at a rate of knots to grab a half length lead they never surrendered, despite repeated attacks from the River Taff boat.

It was a similar story in the masters quads, as Penny, Hartland, Lenny Colling, Chris Cowburn and cox Carswell grabbed an early lead to come home half a length clear of Hereford.

Mixed quad Carswell, Jules Oliva, Penny, Griffiths and cox Ollie Johnson saw off Penarth and Swansea by half a length and one length respectively, but just lost out to Cardiff by half a length in the final, a similar margin of defeat to the capital club for junior boys Dean, Davies, Johnson, Allot-Davey and cox Carswell.

In the afternoon’s sweep oar events, there were some near misses as Monmouth RC crews went close to adding to their haul.

The men’s four of Colling, Hartland, Griffiths and Allot-Davey lost out to event winners Wallingford by one length, while Challis, Clarke, Oliva and Carswell pushed Llandaff to the same margin in the women’s final.

Adrian Tulley and Jon Keyte teamed up with Hartland and Cowburn to push Hereford hard in the masters fours, but also went down by one length.