Mays: end of an era [Stoat]

I first started watching the Mays in 2011, when Caius went head, bumping Pembroke and First & Third along the way. So I selected Caius as my college-to-support, even though we then rowed out of Peterhouse and now row out of Queens, and know people in King’s and Christ’s. In 2013 they were outstanding; in 2014 good and in 2015 they only survived the last day due to a regrettable Pembroke crab.

But this year, whilst they survived Pembroke on Wednesday and LMBC on Thursday and Friday, they finally fell to Maggie on Saturday half way down the reach:

Anyway, this post is for me to collect the videos that I took over this bumps, so I can find them again in years to come:

Saturday: M1, W1, W2, M3
Friday: M1 (part 1) and part 2, W1, M2
Thursday: M1, W1
Wednesday: M1, W1, M2 (and re-row)

If you prefer carnage, there’s a nice example from M2 on Wednesday. Fear not, no one was permanently harmed.

The message boards photos thread contains stuff; and the “predictions” thread contains… errm, well, it is a mixed bag shall we say.

Comments on the headship: coming into bumps, the top three were considered roughly comparable. Maggie had won Press Head, but only by three seconds over Caius; and Caius had beaten LMBC by 3/4 of a length in Nines regatta, though that’s a short course. And Pembroke had beaten both of them by a small margin at Champs eights head. In the end what turned out to matter was the long course. On day 1, Pembroke got to nearly-overlap at Ditton but faded to a 3/4 of a length by the railway bridge, with LMBC what looked like two lengths down; at which point it was so obvious that nothing would happen that I stopped to watch the rest of the division. And yet, astonishingly, LMBC did catch Pembroke; top finish is a long way off. On Thursday I fully expected the “clearly” faster over a shorter distance Pembroke to catch LMBC, but they didn’t get within half a length, and Maggie didn’t trouble a serene looking Caius, who “clearly” had more in them if needed. On Friday I stopped at First Post when it looked like a repeat of Thursday, so I don’t know how the second half went. On Saturday I expected Pembroke to kill themselves trying to get Maggie and fail, and Caius to row over. The first bit happened: Pembroke got within half a length, perhaps a canvas, by the Plough and then died (safely; Jesus at four were bumped by Clare for their blades). Maggie came out of Ditton perhaps a canvas off Caius and bravely (but probably sensibly) steered out of their puddles. Caius were still rowing cleanly, but were overpowered by Maggie (all those winter evenings going at it like jack-rabbits on the ergs paid off), and were caught half way down the reach.

(ps: if you were waiting for the sea ice post, now you know why I was too busy to write it. But hold on, it is coming)