Racing in truly biblical conditions, the 151st Harvard-Yale race arrived at a controversial finish and non-resolution on Sunday, with the Harvard Varsity Eight sinking within the first 1/2 mile of the four-mile course, the referee stopping and red-flagging the race, and the heavily favored Yale crew completing the course. Yale subsequently claimed the win, while the Harvard camp, who had offered to rerow the race after bailing the shell and getting all nine crew members out of the water, insisted (along with the referee) that the result was "no result."
With the racecourse running from the Gold Star Bridge (I-95) upstream towards Bartlett's Cove and into the teeth of a 25mph sustained headwind, the 4-mile Varsity race had the worst conditions of the day. The 3V and 2V races, run prior to the 1V and over the shorter 2- and 3-mile distances respectively, had to contend with challenging but manageable water, but for the Varsity race the additional mile of bad downstream water would prove pivotal.
With concerns about the conditions mounting, chief referee Dug Stowe polled both crews and both sets of coaches prior to the start, and with both camps agreeing to the race, the crews were lined up for a floating start, and the race was started.
Both crews started aggressively into the chop, with Yale getting the better of it early. With both teams running pumps in their hulls (Harvard with three, Yale with eight), both crews contended well with the rough water until just before the first half-mile marker, where the water level in the Harvard crew made any further rowing impossible and the shell began to sink. At this point, the referee raised the red flag to stop the race as the launches began to pull the Harvard athletes out of the water.
The Yale boat had moved another 200 meters upriver by this point, and after a brief pause and a check-in by a Yale coaching launch, someone in the Yale boat was heard to yell "Green light !" (at least as reported in the New Haven Register), and the crew picked it up on the paddle, completed the course, returned to their boathouse and derigged and loaded their boat.
The root of the ensuing controversy regarding the final result of the race seemed to stem from two very different interpretations of what the red flag meant for the outcome of the race. "I am not going to second-guess the referee's decision to stop the race for safety reasons," said Yale coach Steve Gladstone. "The race was run, but it was fractured."
Gladstone also explained his crew's decision to complete the race course, which was motivated both by necessity of getting back on land, and caution over the outcome. "We could not stay out there, in those conditions. With the outcome becoming controversial, we felt that it would be best to row the course. Our boathouse is upstream, and they had to row home."
Harvard's Charley Butt had a different view of things. "It was our hope that, once the race was stopped and the red flag was held, that we would go dump our boat at Coast Guard, and then we would go from that mark forward and finish the race, which is standard protocol," said Butt. "There are any number of murky circumstances here, the race didn't even go an eighth of the distance. The referee's ruling is that there was no race. We're going to think of this as just a major disappointment, frankly, that somehow we couldn't manage to get this iconic event to go down as it should have. "
Gladstone in turn expressed puzzlement at Harvard's offer of a rerow. "That's a really puzzling piece for me," said the Yale coach. "With conditions staying the same into the evening, and into the next day, how could you rerow the race in the same unsafe conditions? Were we going to wait one or two more days to do it?"
As reported in several newspapers, Yale seemed to claim some measure of victory in the race, which Gladstone confirmed to some extent.
"There is a difference in interpretation [between Harvard and Yale] in what this outcome means," continued Gladstone, a view confirmed by Harvard's Charley Butt. "How are the students going to define their year, in terms of Harvard versus Yale?" said Butt. "We had three races, not four. It was a non-race, the referee raised a red flag. I imagine Yale will say it was a race, and I reckon we will say we wish we had a race. The only way to reconcile this is to actually row the piece."
Gladstone also pointed out that no one seemed to know whether there are standards of racing that govern the Harvard-Yale regatta. "It's a shame that there are not specific rules for this race," he said "This means that there is a vacuum, and no protocol for determining what to do in a case like this. I have a deep admiration and respect for the Harvard coaching staff. Charley, Bill [Boyce] and Pat [LaPage] are doing wonderful work over there. What's most difficult is that there are no bad guys here, and that any serious debate about these matters would be petty. The outcome is not very satisfying for either Yale or Harvard, but it is particularly upsetting for my crew. They were a fast crew and were not able to give a full demonstration of their prowess. It was an act of nature, and the guys will need to live with that."
In the absence of specific rules governing this regatta, USRowing rules of racing would likely officially apply, in which case the red flag raised by the referee means that the race is stopped and is no longer in play. That said, if it were to go into the record books – which seems unlikely – the (clearly unofficial) time of 30:41 would stand as the slowest time in the history of the regatta.
As we go to press, it does appear that the dueling versions of the events will stand (Harvard's is here, Yale's here), so that the general rowing public is left to ponder which version to accept, or otherwise try to cobble together the truth which might lie somewhere in between.
Beyond a lack of result, what does get lost in the debate over the outcome is what actually occurred on the water; the Yale crew, rowing as strongly as they have all year, showed impressive fortitude in some of the worst racing conditions ever witnessed. To not end with a clear result is tough season-ender for this group; unlike last year, the crew is not headed to Henley, the Harvard-Yale regatta was their last outing together as a Crew.
There's also no doubt that the Harvard Varsity, even as underdogs, had come to race. "We were really well prepared, our coaches were very intentional in sending us out in the roughest conditions during the past week," said Harvard 1V coxswain Jacqueline Goodman. "We were expecting that," echoed Harvard 7-seat Conor Harrity. "I was focused on trying to row them down, but it got to the point where it was just way too much. There was a little bit of panic, I think we tried to keep focused as best we could, but by the half mile we were done."
So, while obvious "winner" of the day was Mother Nature, the conclusion of the Varsity race overshadowed what was, up to that point, a successful weekend for the Harvard Heavies. Harvard won the 4V/Combi boat race on Saturday afternoon (in what, by all accounts, were great rowing conditions), as well as the 3V and 2V races leading up to the Varsity race, both convincingly, with both of the Harvard lower crews handling the poor conditions impressively.
"I think our guys kept their composure," said Harvard assistant coach Bill Boyce , who, along with assistants Pat LaPage and Erin Driscoll, is responsible for the Harvard lower boats. "They were very excited to race, and very excited to race in poor conditions. We'd prepared them for that significantly, we'd rowed several times this week in very bad conditions for that reason, so I think that when that challenge did come their way that they handled it very well."
"Both boats got off the line really well," continued Boyce, in referring to the Harvard 2V and 3V crews. "That was able to get them to a comfortable lead, and then it's just a matter of rowing smooth, rowing relaxed, do everything you can to not make a mistake once you have a lead."
When asked if it's really possible to describe any rowing in Sunday's conditions as comfortable, Boyce was philosophical. "No, not comfortable, because the boat's never going to feel good, even when they have a nice lead and hanging on to it, they were still catching diggers, hitting wakes, all those kinds of things," said Boyce. "You can get into a mental zone of knowing 'I can do this, as long as we keep believing in the boat', and that's what they were able to do."
For the Harvard 2V, Sunday's win culminated an undefeated season, and the crew will be headed to Henley. Both Charley Butt and Boyce pointed to the 2V's success as part of their ongoing efforts to develop by all accounts a very young Harvard team. "It's a great boat because it's a real cross-section of the team," said Boyce.
With three freshmen and three sophomores in the boat, Boyce is optimistic. "Sometimes, when you get guys in the program, you find you have something special that you weren't aware you had. That's the whole freshman class. They work really hard, they're all wonderful guys, they're all serious students and they're all the full package. The combination of those eight guys, the connection of youthful exuberance and the seasoned leadership just made for an exceptional crew."
Adding to the complications posed by the weather conditions on the Thames River were an unusual number of powerboaters and kayakers that wandered into the course throughout the racing, including one kayaker who crossed in front of the Harvard 3V just about 30 strokes before the finish, causing the crew to make a major steering adjustment. Observers from both Harvard and Yale remarked that this year's course management was among the worst they'd ever seen. Add to this the cloudy results in the marquee event and you can be sure that the 151st Harvard-Yale regatta will be a topic of conversation until the 152nd edition.
Ed Hewitt contributed to this report
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