You tell your neighbour, or you speak to your teacher about the fact that you row, and they ask; “are you going to row in the boat race?” But is the boat race the pinnacle of rowing? Many people who are not involved in the sport will often reflect on the time they watched when Oxford raced against Cambridge on the television. But is this race limiting the sport from growing and reaching a more diverse audience? Does the race create a shadow that other elite clubs have to sit in?
There is no doubt that rowing as a sport prides itself on tradition and this is highlighted with the longevity of the Boat Race which has been running since 1829. This is further backed up by the historic event of Henley Royal Regatta which has been running annually since 1839. However, there is an argument that some traditions need to change with the times as other clubs get faster and stronger than the Oxbridge clubs. For years there have been fixture events taking place on the Tideway in the lead up to the Boat Race. With crews coming from across the UK and abroad to race the blue boats in the run up to the event, including Oxford Brookes University, Leander and Nereus from the Netherlands. These crews will do multiple races against both Oxford and Cambridge to give the blue boats practice on the course with opposition close to them and these fixtures often create a showing of tight racing with high-performance clubs going up against other high-performance clubs.
A change in tradition maybe needed in the future in order to maintain the viewership of the Boat race and a way in which this could be done is that these fixture races could be turned into a knockout tournament in which eight of the most elite clubs from across the UK and internationally battle it out to bag a spot in the final race at the end of the series, the Boat Race. This will give a chance to other teams to show off their programmes, coaches and athletes to the nation which will shine light onto the other clubs who are just as, if not, more successful and dominant than the Oxbridge clubs. This will probably have a lot of opposition initially but as a sport we need to decide if we want to push for growth in the coverage of rowing or are happy with the way it is currently going.
The reason as to why there is a shadow created by Oxford and Cambridge for the other clubs to sit in is because the public are made to believe Oxford and Cambridge are the best clubs for rowing and that the Boat race is the pinnacle of rowing is because of the coverage and following they get on the television. In order for the sport to change the perspective of this they would need to increase the quantity and improve the quality of the current streams of other events such as the Head of the River, Marlow Regatta and Henley Royal Regatta (HRR) to name a few. This would give the public an insight into a clubs journey across the season if each event was given adequate coverage initially on a YouTube livestream like many events currently are with the vision to grow onto a platform on the television. You could look at top line sponsorship being a factor for more events not being broadcast on television but then HRR has got multiple sponsors and is still limited to YouTube livestreams for the events.
British Rowing has attempted to broaden the public’s view of rowing by introducing Power8 Sprints in 2018 however this was not able to continue on in following years due to a lack of sponsorship. This is where adapting the Boat Race could be a success because of the sponsorships that are already in place and the viewership that is currently active. This could be a productive move for the sport because already millions of people tune in to watch the Boat Race and the addition of more races and clubs has the potentially to bring in more views due to the increased competitiveness of the event. Also, this highlights that there needs to be a balance between sponsorship and viewership something that could be reached by increasing the coverage of a traditional event such as HRR where there are more clubs involved with competitive racing across a longer period of time.
In conclusion, mainstream media coverage is the key to grow the public’s perception of the sport and the clubs that they know of and understand and by introducing them to a both traditional but also faster paced event such as HRR may be the push that rowing needs to break into more regular mainstream coverage. This increased coverage will have benefits for the event on its own as well as rowing as a sport on every level. It can increase the potential for sponsorships for individual clubs and athletes as they have more of a media presence and influence. While it also has the ability to filter finances down to grassroot clubs and schools to improve the uptake of rowing from children and grow the future generations of rowers to then take part in these high-level events.
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