Oxford on good Henley form
The popular image of Henley is that of blazer-clad buffoons quaffing vast quantities of Pimms and Champagne, whilst the corporate hordes trough away, with no real knowledge of the sport that they are supposedly there to watch. That image has a great deal of truth in it, as anyone who has even been to "the Royal" will tell you. The other side to Henley, however, is that it is almost universally regarded as the culmination of the British club-rowing season, and is internationally renowned as a high quality rowing event. Everyone wants to row at Henley, and winning a Henley Medal is one of the most prestigious wins in rowing. It isn't just that fact that everyone goes, and so can you truly be said to be testing yourself against the best of Britain, or the fact that, with eighty-three crews from twelve other nations, there is a significant element of international competition. Henley is an event in which the competitors are made to feel special. There are so many spectators that even the most unknown club crew can be cheered the length of the course, and the one-against-one format turns every race into a duel.
Little wonder, then, that the vast bulk of events at the Regatta are over-subscribed, and crews must first qualify to appear - often a major challenge in itself. In the Temple Challenge Cup, for Eights from 'smaller universities and colleges', there were three Oxford entries, two of them composites. Wadham & St Anne's, Brasenose & Exeter and Queen's attempted to qualify on the Friday before racing, but only Wadham & St Anne's made it through to compete in the Regatta itself. On the Wednesday, they beat Oxford Brooks University 'C', putting them through the last sixteen crews, before losing to Imperial College's 'A' crew. This is the third year in a row that Wadham have qualified for this event at Henley, doing so in a composite with Magdalen in 2000 and on their own in 2001.
In the Britannia Challenge Cup, the club and student coxed fours event, five rowers without blues from OUBC, rowing as Isis BC made the quarter-finals of this highly competitive event, beating Durham University, then Norwich RC, before eventually losing to Raven's BC from South Africa, a boat containing several members of the SA National Squad. Oxford's highest status entry came in the Ladies Challenge Plate, the second most senior event at the Regatta. The Eight contained four of the 2002 Blue Boat, and was a seeded crew, giving them a bye into the second round. There they came up against an Eight from Molesey BC, one of most competitive rowing clubs in the UK, which has produced Olympians such as Greg and Jonny Searle, and continues to produce international oarsmen, many of whom were in that eight. Molesey led from the start, but Oxford & Isis fought all the way down the course, and had regained much ground, but they couldn't push through, and they eventually lost by one-third of a length.
Elsewhere in the Regatta, there were Oxford Blues in GB Squad crews rowing under various colours. Robin Bourne-Taylor was in the Oxford Brookes/IC Eight in the Grand Challenge Cup, and Ben Burch, Pesident of OUBC in 2002, was in the Molesey/Oxford Brookes Four that won the Prince Philip Challenge Cup. Both men went on to row in the 2002 Rowing World Championships in the GB Eight, held in Seville, which came sixth overall. All in all, after a year in which Oxford took a clean sweep of the boat races, the summer proved equally successful.
17th Oct 2002