This weekend's Wallingford Regatta has been cancelled due to poor river conditions.

The Environment Agency told organisers the level and flow of the Thames at Wallingford were unsafe for competitors to race.

It is the first time in its 23-year history that the regatta has been cancelled.

Rowing undergoes a change of format this month with side-by-side regatta racing largely giving way to Heads of the River with racing against the clock.

City of Oxford were keen to get in a final regatta last weekend and travelled to the Cambridge Autumn event.

The club suffered disappointment when two of their crews reached their finals before the event was called off due to thunder and lightning.

Local 'heads' coming up include the Wallingford Sculls on September 27, plus the Wallingford Fours and Eights Head on November 30, when they will be hoping for better weather.

The Isis Sculls takes place on September 20, Reading Head on October 5, while the Henley reach will be busy on October 26 and November 15, with the staging of the Upper Thames Small Boat Head and Henley Sculls  Andrea Dennis, of Wallingford RC, won a bronze medal in the World University Championships in Belgrade Racing with her lightweight double sculls partner Frances Fletcher, from Durham University, the duo were just three seconds from a gold.

Dennis, who works for Oxford Brooks University as a lab technician and demonstrator in Sport and Exercise Science while completing a PhD, was fifth in the lightweight single sculls in the 2007 World Championships.