LYR News

• 15th National Junior Indoor Rowing Championships (NJIRC) took place virtually for the first time - giving the opportunity for young people all over the world to compete.

• More than 4,100 young people, representing 125 different schools, clubs and groups competed – making it one of the largest indoor rowing events ever!

• Hosted by London Youth Rowing, NJIRC ’21 celebrated the diversity and inclusivity of the event with young people from all backgrounds competing.

The annual National Junior Indoor Rowing Championships (NJIRC) took place virtually for the first time and saw over 4,100 young people from all backgrounds competing over 3 days of virtual racing.

With the entire event taking place remotely, more junior rowers than ever took part in the sports biggest junior competition platform as the expanded format allowed international entries for the first time.

For the last 15 years NJIRC has become the landmark event in the junior sporting calendar to get young people active and engaged in sport. NJIRC is now synonymous with open access to rowing regardless of background, ethnicity, gender, sexuality or ability.

London Youth Rowing (LYR), founders and hosts of the event, had this year decided to use the current lockdown measures to celebrate the inclusivity of sport.

“London Youth Rowing is built on the idea that rowing should be an inclusive sport." said Andrew Triggs-Hodge, Director of Corporate Engagement at London Youth Rowing.

"Last weekend we delivered the 15th National Junior Indoor Rowing Championships (Njirc) with over 4,000 entries. The highlight was seeing young people from across the UK, and an international crew from South Africa, launch themselves back into sport and competition fresh off lockdown.  There was no lacking in enthusiasm and energy!

Njirc is always such an inspiring event, seeing thousands of young people, from non-rowing backgrounds and schools, throw themselves into the sport that’s generally considered to be exclusive.  Rowing has so much to give, and the work LYR does inspires me to work harder still to help open the sport up further, both at LYR and helping others across the country.

The planning is now already underway for NJIRC ’22, set for 4th March 2022 and we’re looking forward to welcoming everyone back to the Copperbox in London. I’m really looking forward to seeing NJIRC continue to be the shop front of inclusive rowing, inspiring the next generation of young people into the sport and inspire old rowers like myself to play my role in pushing the sport forward.”