The Tideway has been a rather temperamental beast this week - high tides and high winds resulting in rough conditions, giving both sides in the Boat Race something to work on in advance of Sunday's races.

Conditions on Saturday proved no exception, and although the forecast for the main event on Sunday is sun and light winds, the elements continued to act up for the Veterans' Boat Race on Saturday afternoon.

Just to be clear, 'Veteran' is the British rowing terminology for those old enough to know better (we just can't bring ourselves to call them 'Masters') and, befitting of oarsmen of a certain age, the race, which is used as a practice session for the TV cameras, takes place over a shorter course. Usually this means Putney to Hammersmith, but this year, because of the large white horses on show at Putney, it was raced over the second half of the course, from Hammersmith to the finish line where the water was noticably less 'coastal'.

Cambridge have dominated the Vets' race for a long time (indeed, nobody seems able to remember the last time the dark blues won), but for 2009 Oxford had managed to pull together a good mix of old competitors (both ex-blue boat and ex-Isis) and for the first few minutes of the race the crews looked very evenly matched.

In the words of boat race commentator Tim Foster: "I was about to comment that the guys were now reaping the benefit of the hours and years of training that they've put into this race ? but that was 25 years ago."

Cambridge, however, had the benefit of the first bend and used it to slowly edge ahead of Oxford, coming out 1/2L ahead by Chiswick Pier.

With the bend in the course turning to their favour, Oxford started to push Cambridge wide, and as they approached Barnes bridge both crews were both well over to Surrey (the CUBC station) but even though Cambridge were wide on the bend, the umpire still warmed the light blues to prevent them cutting across Oxford as they took the corner.

Cambridge started to move over, but rather than taking the inside of the bend, the Oxford cox went with them. She then appeared to steer at Cambridge "going for the bump" and the crews clashed ? in Cambridge's water. The cox and 2 man of the OUBC crew immediately tried to appeal, but the umpire allowed the race to continue.

Coming out of the clash the crews stayed about the same distance apart, with Cambridge around 3/4L ahead. The light blues put in a powerful 20 strokes to move ahead to a length lead. Oxford, unsettled by the clash, never managed to pull back the difference and Cambridge went on to win by just over a length in a time of 9 mins 6 secs

Still smarting about their loss and over-ruled appeal, Oxford started to row back to Putney, but their bad day was about to get worse...

On the row home they were nearly hit by one of the local sailing dinghies out making full use of the wind. They then got severely washed down by the RNLI, who were belting down the river at full speed to rescue anther of the sailing dinghies that had overturned and finally, just to add insult to injury, on returning to Putney, their two man discovered his car was partially submerged by the high tide and was last seen bailing it out with his hands, just in time for a heavy hailstorm.

Somedays you're better off just staying in bed...

Final line-ups as follows:

I Isis
G Goldie
B Blue
P President
N National team

Cambridge
Martin Haycock (cox) B 93/4, N 93, 96, 99, 02
Sean Gorvy (stroke) G86/7, N87
Johnny Moulsdale G77
Guy Pooley B88-91, N91-96
John Garrett B 83-85 (P) N 84, 86-92
Peter Jacobs G85
Iain Pritchard L77
Sebastian Korbei, G97/8
Neil West L83, N02 (bow)

Oxford
Bow: Duncan Spencer B, 63 ? 65 (P)
2: Nick Holland I80, B82
3: Andrew Gordon-Brown
I93, B94, N92/95
4: Tony Mitchell I82
5: Boris Mavra B92, 93, 95
6: Hugh Corroon B95
7: Ed Bellamy B96, I97 (P)
Str: Kingsley Poole I90, B92-94 (P)
Cox: Kajsa Mclaren B00