THE BOAT RACE.
THE fact that Oxford beat the record in the Boat Race of this year by sixteen seconds does not mean that they were a better crew than ever rowed before. There was an exception- ally strong tide, which was something more than a large spring tide; it was favoured by special astronomical condi- tions, and those of us who have watched many Boat Races cannot remember to have seen such a swinging rush of water combined with a perfect surface for rowing. The weight of water made one of the skiffs at the starting place drag her anchor, and the Oxford eight and the skiff started to drift off up the river, and there was a delay of several minutes. This did no harm to Oxford's time, as at the end of those minutes the tide was probably running faster than ever. Exactly such a tide as this, one thinks, would hays been impossible in the old dip when the river banks were more ragged and the water spread itself in a more leisurely fashion. Now the water is projected through something like a smooth funnel most of the way from Putney to Hammersmith. One would have liked to see a crew like the famous Cambridge crew of 19C0 rowing last Saturday. Their time would probably have been nearer 18 minutes dead than the 18 minutes 29 seconds which Oxford took. In the conditions which produce a fast time, apart from the excellence of a crew, the important point besides the tide—and it may be more or less important than the tide, according to its strength—is the wind. Almost every wind is unfavour- able at some part of the serpentine course. A west wind is very bad ; the faint north-easterly airs of last Saturday were favourable as could be. It is not to be supposed, however, that a wind from some easterly quarter, even when it blows strongly with the crews for the greater part of the course, always means a fast time. When a crew are not first- class, one of the most demoralising things is a following wind. In a sea-going boat it could, of course, only help the boat along, but with a delicate racing ship the result is often very different. The wind on the blades of the oars makes the crew hurry their bodies as they swing forward, and nothing checks the way of a boat between the strokes more than the plunging or flopping forwards of the dead weight of eight men. It is difficult enough in any circumstances to acquire the rhythm of the steady, controled forward swing and the hard driven springy backward swing of the bodies, but what appears to be a favourable wind makes it doubly difficult. For crews not above the average an absolutely windless day is often the fastest.
The Boat Race of this year will be always remembered not only for the record time but because the race was watched for the first time from an aeroplane. Most of the spectators had probably never seen an aeroplane in flight before. For them it must have been one of the moments of a lifetime when four aeroplanes suddenly grew out of the still haze and circled and re-circled in a bunch over the river with a wonderful air of precision and stability. The shouts which pursued them along the banks were even greater than that wonderful roar which keeps pace with the crews for over four miles during the race. At length three of the aeroplanes hummed away into the haze from which they bad appeared, but a biplane remained and followed the race from start to finish, wheeling in circles above the crews. How anyone could still suppose after that demon- stration that aeroplanes have no sort of practical future will no doubt pass the comprehension of most of those pleased and astonished onlookers.
The race was a struggle between two very different styles, or rather one should say between a crew (Oxford) who bad little polish but the essentials of the science of rowing, and a crew (Cambridge) who had a most pleasing and uniform - appearance without enough of the essential driving force. The essentials are length of swing and the piston-like drive of the legs combined with it Some oarsmen have tried for years and have never brought
the strength of their legs into really useful relation with their arms and back. The least observant spectator of rowing must have noticed the difference between rowing in a racing ship and rowing on the sea. In the former the arms are only con- necting links between the back and the legs, and the oarsman is true to his theory by avoiding the use of the word " When an oarsman has acquired the elusive knack of being able to use all the strength of his legs in driving the blade through the water (or, to be more strictly theoretical, of lifting the boat past the place in which he has placed the blade) it is a revelation to him. When eight men are using their legs in perfect unison, the boat responds like an animate thing. The unresponding boat keeps the oarsman cramped and uncomfortable, as though he could never row at a proper mechanical advantage; but the respond- ing boat feels spacious, and every stroke gives a feeling of power satisfactorily and comfortably applied. Of course, in the case of crews who are so far advanced in the art of rowing as University crews, there is no question of a crew not using their legs at all. Cambridge used their legs, and used them hard, throughout an extremely plucky stern-chase, but they did not come within several degrees of the united leg-power of Oxford. And their swing was also sensibly shorter. But they were a real human machine, admirably fitted together for all that. Throughout the race they never once lost their form ; never became ragged ; and it required grit to row as they did when the least experienced eye could see that their boat was not running between the strokes like Oxford's.
Mr. Bourne, the Oxford Stroke, rowed with a genius for his job. He is not a pretty oar--far from it—but ugliness of movement has afflicted some of the best Strokes who ever sat in a boat. One day a legend will gather round the Strokes who by some magic have achieved all that their form seemed to proclaim impossible. The good Stroke knows by instinct the state of the men swinging invisibly behind him; he quickens the stroke just when he feels by that same instinct that the " psychological moment" has come, and that a rally will be taken up with the greatest advantage. But he is capable of remaining perfectly cool and collected when quickening is not desirable, and he remains so, even though he has disconcerting glimpses in the tail of his eye of the stern canvas of the rival boat slipping further away at every stroke. If he feels that the finish of each stroke is not being properly rowed out by the men behind with their hands well home on to the chest, and the legs driving hard to the last, he gives the crew a shade more time at the finish. If he feels that the beginning of each stroke is not marked with the dash and spring which should be there as the oars grip the water, he emphasises more and more that part of the stroke. He can tell what is wrong by the "feel" of the boat. Many excellent oars cannot feel these things, and therefore cannot be Strokes. Why it should be so is a mystery. But a good Stroke's generalship—for it is nothing less—encompasses his opponents as well as his friends. He judges their pace and is conscious whether they are rowing at a faster or slower rate than himself ; he knows whether they are tiring ; and when he thinks the moment has come to paralyse them, either by overtaking them or by putting a disheartenink distance between himself and them, he " goes for' Ahem with a demoniac) fury which communicates itself to every member of his crew. The success of a spurt depends as much on Seven as on Stroke. It is Seven who locks the two sides of a crew together, and if he is not responsive to the faintest suggestion of a quickening by Stroke he is a had Seven. Many races have been won by Sevens. Both Sevens this year were good, and Mr. Fairbairn in the Cambridge crew deserved to win if any man ever did. Dr. G. 0. Bourne, the old Oxford Blue, who taught his son, the success- ful Stroke of the last three years, to row, may well be proud. All (except Cambridge men, who may be allowed a slight reservation) will be pleased if Mr. R. C. Bourne beats another record next year by stroking a winning crew for the fourth time.
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