Magdalen Retain Head
Magdalen Men’s row to headship glory past a crowded boathouse on the Isis
Summer Eights, the biggest inter-collegiate competition of the year, took place this week in front of a crowd of over 10,000 sun-bathed supporters. The standard of rowing on display varied from the strength and polished technique shown by the top college crews to the numerous ‘beer boats’ who did not let lack of skill dent their enthusiasm. Despite the comic value and ‘carnage’ of the lower divisions, the real excitement was at the top.
On the men’s side, Magdalen were never pushed as they rowed over on all four days to maintain the headship that they gained last year for the first time in 50 years. On the Saturday Oriel, with the addition of World Champion Peter Reed, pushed closer than on any previous day, but the composure of the headship crew was never dented and they rowed over cleanly.
Magdalen men’s captain David Cox expressed satisfaction with the result, telling the Oxford Student “From the first outing after Torpids, everyone in the boat had it in their minds that all that mattered for the next several weeks was retaining the headship.” “Oriel were always going to be a fast crew, but in the end we proved ourselves to be significantly faster than them.
�� Oriel Captain Tom Akin paid tribute to Magdalen’s achievement, but expressed disappointment at Oriel’s performance, saying “obviously we were pleased to stay ahead of Pembroke, but we had hoped to build on our strong performance in Torpids by challenging Magdalen for the headship. In the end we just weren’t fast enough, and Magdalen were too strong.” Perhaps the most exciting race of the week developed below them, between Oriel in second place and Pembroke in third.
The two crews have a long-running rivalry, and this year was no exception as Pembroke pushed Oriel to within a canvas on the Friday. However, on Saturday Oriel’s strengthened crew proved too much for the men in pink, and they were unable to fulfil their undoubted promise. Lower in the division, Christ Church looked to be the strongest eight of the competition, with 3 full blues and one half blue, as well as a number of members of this year’s lightweight squad.
Their undoubted superiority enabled them to reverse their fall of last year, when they were bumped every day to be awarded ‘spoons’, by winning blades despite an encounter with the bank on Thursday when the cox was foiled by the small dimensions of the rudder and was forced to put his hands in the water to steer. Balliol gave a strong performance, building on their 2004 placing as they ascended from 6th to 4th.
University College bumped on consecutive days to firmly establish themselves in the first division and were unlucky to miss a bump on Wednesday when Wadham bumped out ahead of them. Less fortunate were Lincoln, who continued last year’s plummet, finishing in the 2nd division. In the women’s competition, New College’s rowover on Saturday was an unexpected result.
Pembroke pushed them to within a quarter of a length on Wednesday while narrowly avoiding being bumped by Teddy Hall, and when Hall bumped Pembroke on Thursday most expected them to bump up easily on the following day. However, New found an extra gear and were able to use the advantage of clean water to maintain the headship by a comfortable margin on both Friday and Saturday.
Cynthia Drakeman, New College’s women’s captain, expressed delight at the result, “this is a tremendous achievement, especially in the light of the fact that we didn’t have a coach this term…while there are always nerves and uncertainties going into Eights, when we were challenged by the best Pembroke and Teddy Hall had to throw at us we made the decision as a crew that we would fight with everything we had left to keep the headship” Lower down, Wadham rose two places to put themselv
within striking distance of the headship. Hertford and Magdalen were both unlucky to miss blades by one bump, but were consoled by having now established themselves in the first division. Their success came at the expense of Merton and St Catz, both of whom fell four places. The second division proved an exciting contest, with Worcester men producing another strong performance to climb three places after winning blades last year.
LMH were less fortunate, dropping to the top of division 3, while Corpus Christi were bumped on every day of Eights to win ‘spoons’. Both Oriel and Linacre’s women’s boats, each with a substantial number of returning blues, put in strong performances to rise 3 places each, while St John’s and Exeter each rose 5 places to win blades in style.
2nd Jun 2005