11 June 2024

By Göran R Buckhorn

Charley Butt’s Varsity crew win on the Thames.

Harvard won the 4-mile 1st Varsity race in the Yale-Harvard Regatta on the Thames River on Saturday, 8 June, thereby living up to Murray Taylor’s lines:

So, when we’ll conquer old Eli’s men.
And when the game ends we’ll sing again,
Ten Thousand Men of Harvard gained victory today! –
(“Ten Thousand Men of Harvard”)

However, it looked like it was going Yale’s way as they won the first three races of the regatta. The Friday race for 4th Varsity (2-mile) easily went to the Bulldogs, winning by more than 16 seconds. Then on Saturday morning, which offered sunny weather, Yale won the 3rd Varsity (2-mile) after having trailed behind Harvard in the beginning of the race, winning by slightly more than 10 seconds. In the 2nd Varsity (3-mile), the Bulldogs, who were behind in the beginning of the race, crossed the finish line 13 seconds ahead of Crimson.

Would it be a fourth victory – a clean sweep – for the Bulldogs in the Varsity (4-mile) everyone wondered when the crews lined up under the Gold Star Memorial Bridge. Despite Harvard getting a somewhat sloppy start, the crew still managed to lead at the start. Crimson then increased their lead with several boat lengths.

Harvard’s website published a short report where the article writer mentioned that the Crimson boat took a commanding lead and “never looked back.” Which, of course, is exactly what they did. They comfortably looked back at the Bulldogs who were desperately trying to catch up.

And the Bulldogs might have caught up, if the race had been slightly longer than 4 miles. Yale got closer at the last couple of hundred meters. Josh Brangan, a sophomore from Lymington, England, who rowed at 7 in Harvard’s boat, looked ragged. While his oar went in and out of the water, his strokes became shorter and without much power to the blade.

Those who followed “the other boat race” on the River Thames in London on 30 March this year, remember how Cambridge stroke, Matt Edge, rowed the last couple of minutes in a semi-conscious state before Cambridge crossed the finish line as winners. 

But for the Bulldogs on Saturday, it was too late, and Crimson won a sweet victory by almost 5 seconds.

It was Harvard’s first victory in the 1st Varsity race since 2014, the same year coach Charley Butt took over from Harry Parker, who died in June 2013.

The 157th edition gave us the following results:

4V – 2-mile upstream (for The James Snider Cup)
1. Yale: 9:09.2
2. Harvard: 9:25.9

3V – 2-mile upstream (for The New London Cup)
1. Yale: 9:37.8
2. Harvard: 9:48.4

2V – 3-mile upstream (for The F. Valentine Chappell Trophy)
1. Yale: 15:04.8
2. Harvard: 15:28.4

1V – 4-mile upstream (for The Sexton Cup)
1. Harvard: 19:40.2
2. Yale: 19:44.8

The Hoyt C. Pease and Robert Chappell Jr. Trophy, which is presented to the crews who win two or more of the races, went to Yale.