It's day two of Henley Royal Regatta, so let me introduce you to the legendary booms. Why on earth would you put something which can cause catastrophic crashes at the side of a racing course?
Henley's held on a river, originally the normal form of water course for competitive rowing in Britain. It's been held on a river for 178 years (168 regattas due to the four- and six-year gaps of the two world wars), and in true kindly British style the regatta arranges a transit lane so that passing boats can cruise safely by without disturbing the racing, and spectators can stop to stare.
But with the advent of first steam and then motorised boats in the 1800s, faster river traffic and more intrusive spectators, it became important to avoid side-wash and keep back the on-water crowds which gathered, thousands of boats at a time, to watch the racing. In 1899 Henley Royal created a straight course marked by upright wooden piles on both sides, and with the gaps between these posts filled by horizontal floating wooden booms. These repel and absorb the wash created by motor-boats and offer a solid plank to which spectators can moor beside the course in their traditional wooden skiffs.
The only problem is, they're far too easy to hit.
And as the competition started to wind itself up to top rate on Thursday, there were some nervous moments along those booms. The Prince of Wales quads for Queensland, Leander and Tideway Scullers/Tyrian had near-miss encounters of the boomy kind, as did St Paul's Girls' quad - who saved their sanity with some nifty steering but still lost to Henley A. In the same girls' event Headington B appeared to be steering very fine early on, but as Henley B hauled ahead of them near the finish line it all went to pot and Headington veered sharply towards the woodwork.
Durham University had a proper 'clonk' as they tried to match the pace of New York Athletic in the Visitors' coxless fours, and Grenoblois against France/Monaco in the same event managed to miss the booms but nearly hit each other before Grenoblois sprinted for a well-deserved win.
But the carpentry award of the day went to City of Bristol's B crew who clattered in classic fashion smack into the first upright after the island buoys. Five lengths down within a minute is not a good look but Bristol had anticipated this by starting the Instagram account "Boom Hunters 2017". @herecomestheb00m claims to be "On a mission from God (Mike Teti) to honour the sacred 4- tradition of hitting booms, whenever and wherever we find them." Sadly neither they nor their A crew will be able to thwack any more booms (or b00ms) in racing at this Henley but will have to settle for hitting the bars instead.
There was a mishap of a more unusual kind when winning Oxford Blue, Harvard grad, and two-times US team member Matt O'Leary misjudged his approach to the stakeboat in the Diamonds and promptly fell in the water ahead of his race against Craftsbury sculler John Graves. Soaking and slightly robbed of poise O'Leary, who will race as USA's second LM1x in Lucerne, climbed back in and went ahead with the race, which Graves had no trouble winning.
(Ironically, Graves fell in while pulling into the stakeboats at the first USRowing Speed Order this spring.)
The third race of the day served up a thriller in the Britannia Cup as Germans Bayer Leverkusen raced Molesey, who had been coached recently by Johnny Searle. Matching Searle's own Barcelona 1992 exploits Molesey came back from a full length down with a massive 'Hampton-style" sustained push, but Bayer hung on grimly and took the final photofinish verdict by a foot. Ninety minutes later Riverside and the Bard's local club Stratford-upon-Avon went toe-to-toe in very similar fashion, Stratford taking a length early on and being closed down determinedly by Riverside, who could not close the final canvas to the Englishmen's bow.
Closer than that was Tideway Scullers A's four-foot verdict against Irishmen Clonmel in the Fawley quads, an event which is getting tighter by the moment. Scholastic champions Malvern Prep Sch A came up against unselected Gloucester, and after what appears to have been some untelevised contact early on in the race, appealed the result when Gloucester won by three lengths. The umpire wasn't having any of it, and Gloucester now have to take on UK champions Windsor Boys' School as a reward for their win.
In the Thames Cup club eights, Friday sees Thames A, who beat Leeds, take on Norske Studenters Oslo, the 2016 runners-up, who defeated London B. This year the Norwegian crew have collected themselves a local cox in the shape of Henley yoga teacher Kara Wirt, who doesn't normally speak Norwegian. However, the crew is coached in English, so she seems not to be having any trouble. What is the Norwegian for 'downward dog,' anyway?
In all, twenty-one of the record sixty US crews entered for Henley this year are still in the draw. In the Princess Elizabeth schoolboy eights a freak of the draw pits four British crews - St Paul's, Eton, Radley and Shiplake - against four overseas entries - Deerfield Academy, St Alban's, Gonzaga High School and Australians Scotch College.
St Alban's had a cracking row against old rivals Montclair, to whom they have ceded victories at a couple big events this year. In Henley it was St Alban's who had the extra ounce of grit to get them through, while Deerfield turned over Kent School with what is becoming a trademark row-through, after trailing for the best part of a mile. They will find Eton, who are coming into form at just the right time, considerably harder to upset on Friday. Eton will be pulling their hearts out for highly respected coach Alex Henshilwood, who is giving up leading the rowing program to become a housemaster.
A laudably high standard of entries led the Stewards to extend the sizes of several events, including the Princess Royal women's singles and also the junior women's quads. On Friday, which is rapidly becoming Ladies' Day, the men's pairs, fours and rest of the women's contests begin, including the three new events for W4-, W2- and W2x.
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