Abingdon School’s first eight secured a thrilling victory at the Schools Head of the River.

Starting second behind Eton, they held off an early challenge from Shrewsbury in third to set up a strong rhythm through the middle of the race to Hammersmith Bridge.

In the final stages, Abingdon, coached by Athol Hundermark, closed in on Eton to win by five seconds.

It is the second time that Abingdon have won the trophy – the first was in 2002.

The successful crew were Neil McKenzie, Vassilis Ragoussis, Felix Newman, William Sadler, John Carter, Andrew Halls, AJ Hatzis, Jamie Copus and William Davey.

Abingdon’s second crew soon overtook Shrewsbury and secured second place, seven seconds behind Eton.

The combined times of Abingdon’s first, second and J16 eights secured the Thames Team Trophy for Abingdon, two seconds ahead of Eton.

The J16s rowed down Eton in the closing stages to win by two seconds.

John Gearing, Radley’s coach, also had something to celebrate.

His first eight bettered Shiplake and King’s, Chester, moving them up to the same time as Shrewsbury with whom they shared the third-place honours.

Meanwhile, Oxford Brookes were the only local winners at the 252-crew Women’s Eights Head last Saturday.

The Brookes women moved up to seventh overall from their starting place of 14th, good enough to give them the University pennant for the race.

City of Oxford and Wallingford’s top crews finished 19th and 22nd respectively, City improving on their starting place by 13 places.