At some point in every sensitive young Oxonian’s life he admits that he should have gone to Cambridge. Since graduating I have found it so much lovelier and livelier than dreary Oxford. Had I my time again I’d join the Tabs, not shoe them. Disillusioned as I am, however, every year I summon up some residual loyalism for the annual peak of the Oxbridge calendar: the Boat Race.
God knows why I bother. In the six races since I matriculated, Oxford’s men have won only once, and the women not at all. My Boat Race Day usually entails a dejected (and expensive) tour of Putney’s pubs. Yet I still join the hundreds of thousands who line the Thames each year, participating in a tradition stretching back to 1829, when Cambridge first challenged Oxford for a prize of 500 guineas.
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