After a hiatus, the classic Tideway head returns next weekend. It’s a classic race with a storied history, and winning the event outright – and becoming the Head of the River – is an honour for even the most experienced crew.
The Fairbairn Trophy, named for Steve Fairbairn, the founder of the event back in 1926 and a prominent Cambridge University BC athlete, is awarded to the fastest overall crew. This year, as ever, the competition will be between some very stacked crews at the top end. With the current crop of Caversham athletes returning to home clubs, once again the fight for supremacy at HORR will be a display of some of the finest rowing that the country has to offer.
Oxford Brookes University BC
Brookes have won the Fairbairn Trophy every HORR since 2016 (though they shared the prize with Leander when they finished in exactly the same time in 2018). They’re a massively impressive institution at this point, with multiple wins at student, intermediate and open level at Henley Royal over the past few years, as well as international representation at U23 and senior level. Despite losing a huge number of their top level athletes to Caversham, this year the student crop at Brookes has still been performing at a high level, winning a number of early-season head races and giving Olympian-laden boats from Oxford and Cambridge a run for their money.
HORR will be a different story, however, as Caversham athletes are returning to the fold to race. That means that the top two Brookes eights will be stacked with current and future Olympians and senior national team members, including ‘old guard’ Olympians like Josh Bugajski and Rory Gibbs, as well as ‘Project Paris’ athletes like Freddie Davidson, David Bewicke-Copley, Tom Digby, Sam Bannister, Sam Nunn and Lenny Jenkins. Mixing these guys in with the very best student athletes at Brookes who have shown they can already hold their own at the highest national level, is a recipe for some serious speed. Expect Brookes at the top of the pack, and several Brookes boats populating the top 5.
Leander Club
Leander has consistently maintained its position at the top level of British club rowing for decades. The club enjoys a storied history, high-performance environment and very close connection to the national team, using the GB training programme as significant inspiration. They’ve won the Fairbairn trophy 14 times (including the 2018 dead heat with Brookes), with boats populated by senior national team athletes.
This year might be their best shot at reclaiming the headship.
While their early season has been somewhat disappointing, playing second fiddle several times to the Brookes students and suffering some fairly convincing losses to Oxford and Cambridge, they undoubtedly have a great deal of talent currently on the squad – ex-OUBC President Felix Drinkall, James Vogel and Ryan Todhunter to name a few – and they’ll be bolstered by a huge number of Caversham athletes, including Tokyo Olympians like Matt Rossiter and Sholto Carnegie. My instinct is that Leander ‘A’ could pose a serious challenge to Brookes ‘A’, though Brookes ‘B’ will beat Leander ‘B’ handily – there’s just limitless depth in the Brookes roster.
Durham University BC
Durham aren’t necessarily the first club that comes to mind when it comes to top student rowing programmes. They’ve produced some great athletes in recent years, but, particularly in the eight, they often haven’t produced competitive top-level speed relative to clubs like Brookes, UL, Newcastle or Imperial. This year seems to be a dramatic change for Durham, however. Convincing early-season wins against Edinburgh set the stage for a truly dominant performance at BUCS Head, where they took the headship ahead of a strong Imperial College crew. For the first time in recent memory, Durham look to be pushing towards the top of the student eight hierarchy, and it will be interesting to see how they fare on the competitive HORR stage.
Newcastle University BC
Newcastle always produce fierce, highly technical units, and have seen great results at BUCS and Henley in recent years. They seem to have been struggling a bit this year, culminating in a pretty severely off-the-pace performance at BUCS Head. That being said, the Blue Star were missing four athletes who were attending GB Trials, so they’re certainly due an injection of speed. What might make the difference for them at HORR is whether or not their heavy-hitter alumni return; namely James Rudkin and Tom Ford. If the two Olympians decide to race with their alma mater, Newcastle could be a formidable crew, and would certainly be looking to crack the top ten, if not the top six.
Imperial College London BC
Imperial have had a great season so far, bolstered by talented athletes like Casper Woods, Max Ridgwell and Noam Mouelle. They’ve had good results at Fours Head, Quinten Head and pushed Durham fairly close at BUCS Head. They’ll be looking for revenge here, probably confident that they have the potential to challenge for the top end of student rowing come the summer. Imperial always produce very technical crews that often lack the raw horsepower of programmes like Brookes, though it looks like this year they have a bit of a physically stronger crew, so it will be interesting to see if they can unlock more speed and continue to rise through the ranks.
Thames RC
The local powerhouse, Thames will be looking to repeat their solid result from HORR 2019 (seventh, just behind UL). They’ve got the personnel to do it; Thames are enjoying the presence of some gap-year athletes from American programmes (Freddie Elwes and Matteo Sandrelli, Italian international, coming from Yale, to name but two). Their pedigree hasn’t yet materialised into race wins, but it’s still early in terms of the season’s progression. Thames will be looking to perform solidly, particularly relative to other club-level boats (Molesey, Tideway Scullers, etc), with a view towards Henley wins in the summer. Expect a top 10 finish.
Molesey BC
Molesey have had a great history of high-finishing crews at HORR, due mostly to a large crop of Olympians in the 2000s and 2010s rowing out of Molesey as their home club. Times have changed however, and where once Olympians generally were split between Leander and Molesey, there has been a decisive shift away from Molesey and towards Oxford Brookes (with Leander remaining a large national team feeder). This means that this Molesey crew will likely be just club guys, though the boat should still be competitive, with experienced young athletes like Cameron Spurling and Joe Middleton providing a real injection of speed into the programme. The battle between Molesey and Thames may be an interesting precursor of things to come in the summer.
University of London BC
ULBC will have the advantage of home water here, the importance of which can’t be understated on a long, stream-heavy course like the Tideway. That being said, aside from some decent matched eights results at Quinten Head earlier in the year, there’s not a huge amount to go on to suggest that UL will make a serious impact on this category, particularly given the calibre of entries at the top level. They’ve got some talent at the top end with the likes of Tom Cross and Joe Trevor, so they’ll be looking for a strong performance here, but I think they’ll struggle to crack the top five.
Prediction
HORR 2022 should be a great event, and a brilliant display of some very fast rowing. In terms of predictions for the Fairbairn Trophy, I’m going to go with Oxford Brookes ‘A’ for the title, followed closely by Leander Club ‘A’, with Oxford Brookes ‘B’ a bit behind them. Brookes ‘C’ and Leander ‘B’ will round out the top five, and beyond that, all the crews listed above could realistically challenge for that sixth place position. Indeed, I imagine places 6-12 will be very tight.
Good luck to all crews.
Five Man
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