CRA Bumps 2016 saw a record 110 crews participating, with 26 of those crews – nearly 24% – coming from Cantabs. This is the largest ever bumps entry from the club, and we believe it is the largest by any club.
Rather than attempt a blow-by-blow account of every crew’s race, the results from Day 1 have been summarised into two graphics – click on the images to see a larger version. Highlights giving more detailed descriptions of the antics of selected crews can be read below.
Full results are available on the CRA website.
Spotlight on…Fourth Boats to be Reckoned with!
M4 – Hills Road had a pretty special day on the river. In his usual understated style, their spokesman reports:
Cantabs M4 – Hills Road
“Incredible scenes at the river today for the first night at this year’s town bumps! The Hills Road Men’s First VIII moved up from 19th to 15th – including a miraculous over bump in their second race of the day – here is the crew celebrating after having had such a successful first night!”
Based on Ken Drake’s research, we believe this is the first over-bump in the Men’s First Division since 1994, before the Hills crew were born. Congratulations to the crew and their coaches!
W4 – Intermediate Women would only have the chance to race once on Tuesday, starting from the 7th chain in Women’s Division Two. Sam Hardy writes:
Cantabs W4 – Intermediate Women
“W4 pushed strongly off the start (after recovering from the shock of the cannon!). They were inside distance within the first few strokes. The crew continued to close steadily down First Post Reach until hitting rough water as the approached the stern of Champs W4. Pushing through the final stretch W4 made the last push to get the bump on First Post Corner. With first day nerves overcome we hope the crew will continue to row well and improve through the week.”
Spotlight on…Youth vs Experience
Michael Walker reports:
“Bumps week for M11 (InVeterEight) had been planned down to the last detail, so that absolutely nothing could go wrong. A crack squad of athletes had spent many months in serious training, the boat had been fine-tuned by an established expert (P. Knights) – and subsequently de-tuned by the rest of us – and it had been firmly established that we were, after all, allowed to get the blades wet. Meticulous attention to detail had even extended to producing spectacularly unrepresentative times in events such as the X-Press Head and the Time Race, so that no inkling of our true thoroughbred stature could have leaked through to the opposition.
“So, we bowled up to the start of division 3 on the first night of the Cambridge Town Bumps in reasonably good heart. From within the boat, everything seemed as normal as it always does from that situation: The crew in front looked five hundred yards away, a string of tiny dots on the horizon, the crew behind roughly eighteen inches from us and the four-minute gun went off within twenty seconds of our count. We really fancied our chances of over-hauling X-Press’ sixth boat, whilst the crew chasing us, Nines 7, surely stood no chance. In pre-race theorising, they were slated to fizzle out before the motorway bridge, having exhausted themselves rowing-over as sandwich boat earlier. As it turned out, they had merely warmed up. In practice, the final gun saw us bolt from the start like a colony of startled but arthritic rabbits whilst, dimly discernible through a curtain of foam we had thrown up as an impromptu cloaking device, the purposeful advance of Nines 7 mutated from perceptible to inexorable in the space of less than a minute. Thinking to spare these poor fellows – some of them lads barely out of their twenties, really – the public humiliation that would have come their way if we had eluded them, natural gallantry and an old-fashioned sense of chivalry prompted us to concede the bump soon afterwards. Having exchanged compliments with our former foes, we paddled slowly – some might say almost painfully slowly – back to the boathouse, enjoying the light-hearted chaffing from the bank we received en route. Still, tomorrow is another day….”
