🚣 Row, Row, Row Your Boat: The Day the Thames Got Its Drama Crowned

🚣 Row, Row, Row Your Boat

The Boat Races 2016 took place on 27 March 2016. Held annually, The Boat Race is a side-by-side rowing race between crews from the universities of Oxford and Cambridge along a 4.2-mile (6.8 km) tidal stretch of the River Thames in south-west London. For the first time in the history of the event, the men’s, women’s and both reserves’ races were all held on the Tideway on the same day. 🏛️

🏛️ Background & History

The Boat Race is a side-by-side rowing competition between the University of Oxford (sometimes referred to as the “Dark Blues”) and the University of Cambridge (sometimes referred to as the “Light Blues”). First held in 1829, the race takes place on the 4.2-mile (6.8 km) Championship Course, between Putney and Mortlake on the River Thames in south-west London. The rivalry is a major point of honour between the two universities; it is followed throughout the United Kingdom and broadcast worldwide. 💦

Oxford went into the 2016 race as champions, having won the 2015 race by a margin of six lengths, but Cambridge led overall with 81 victories to Oxford’s 79 (excluding the 1877 race, officially a dead heat though claimed as a victory by the Oxford crew).

🌊 A Historic First

It was the first time in the history of The Boat Race that all four senior races — the men’s, women’s, men’s reserves’ and women’s reserves’ — were held on the same day and on the same course along the Tideway. Prior to 2015, the women’s race, which first took place in 1927, was usually held at the Henley Boat Races along the 2,000-metre course. 🚣

📅 Race Day — 27 March 2016

On Sunday 27 March, the women’s race started at 3:10 p.m. British Summer Time, the women’s reserve race at 3:25 p.m., the men’s reserves’ race fifteen minutes later and the men’s race a further half-hour after that at 4:10 pm. The men’s race was umpired for the fifth time by Simon Harris, who had overseen the inaugural Tideway running of the Women’s Boat Race in 2015. 🏆

🎯 Results

In the men’s reserve race, Cambridge’s Goldie were beaten by Oxford’s Isis by two lengths, their sixth consecutive defeat. In the women’s reserve race, Cambridge’s Blondie defeated Oxford’s Osiris by three lengths, their first victory since the 2011 race. In the women’s race, Oxford won easily as Cambridge nearly sank in rough conditions. It was Oxford’s fourth consecutive win, and their eighth in nine races. The men’s race was won by Cambridge by two and a half lengths, their first victory since the 2012 race, taking the overall record in the event to 82–79 in their favour. 🏅

🔗 Wikipedia article of the day — Full Article