THE SPORT OF ROWING “During the last day or two of the term, the captain, with a view to making up his Torpids for the next term, generally tries to arrange one or two crews selected from the best of the freshmen and such of the old hands as are available, and justly proud is a freshman if, having got into a boat for the first time at the beginning of the term, he finds himself among the select few for the first Torpid at the end of it.”189 Rowe & Pitman: “At the beginning of the [Hilary] term the college crew, or crews, will start regular practice, and gradually those who are to row will be chosen, and their order settled. Strict training will commence from a fortnight to three weeks before the races begin, and thenceforward all members of the crews will have to be in bed and up be- times, to cut off smoking, and to live on wholesome food and drink – with only a limited quantity of the latter. This simple régime should prove no great hardship to any but the confirmed smoker, and this the freshman is hardly likely to be as yet, except in imagination.”190 Pitman: “The Torpids train for about three weeks before the races, which take place at the end of the fourth and fifth weeks in [Hilary] term.191 “Most of the college captains devote their time after the Torpids, for the rest of the term, to coaching their men in sliding- seat tubs, the time at the beginning of the summer term being so short that it is abso- lutely necessary to get the men who have been rowing on fixed seats in the Torpids thoroughly accustomed to slides by the end 189 C.M. Pitman, Isthmian Rowing, pp. 197-8 190 Rowe & Pitman, p. 165 191 C.M. Pitman, Isthmian Rowing, p. 199 of the Lent term, and also to have the com- position of the next term’s eight as nearly as possible settled. “It is the custom at most colleges to make the eight come into residence about a week before the end of the [Easter] vacation. “The Eights are rowed at the end of the fourth week and at the beginning of the fifth week in term, six nights in all.”192 Frank Dadd, Woodgate Bumping The format of the Torpids, Lents, Eights and Mays races held every year at the Uni- versities is unique. “Bumping,” as it is called, goes back to the very beginnings of recreational rowing on the Isis and the Cam. Rowe & Pitman: “In each case, the nar- rowness of the river and the large number of crews competing make it almost impossible for the racing to take place in any other way.”193 192 Ibid. 193 Rowe & Pitman, p. 168 60
