Newsletter#1, Hilary Term, 1996 (1st February)

With a bit of luck - touch Kevlar? - we may have got the floods out of the way early this year. A wet end to 1995 resulted in a healthy torrent at the start of term, during which only a select few coxes and crews were allowed out, but by the end of 1st week the stream had subsided and the Isis was opened to all and sundry (and with no less than 7 boats, Catz are sundrier than most).

The women selected their 1st Torpid at the end of last term and have been training since the beginning of 0th Week, with just a slight hiccup as Natalie Waterfield resigned from the captaincy, and then rowing, to spend more time with her books, while Adrienne Gumm took over and swapped sides so that now she really does lead from the front. The men made a rather more casual start with trials deferred until the end of 1st week but at least had solid basis from last term's Nephthys Regatta crews. The present Catz 1st Torpids are (*denotes ex-1st Torpid/Eight):

Men's 1st Torpid	Women's 1st Torpid
B Jerry Bretherton	B Adrienne Gumm*
2 Richard Law	2 Anna-Marie Ullmann
3 Ed Smith	3 Daljit Gill
4 Matt Holdcroft	4 Emily Skor
5 Samer Hakoura*	5 Rebecca Killick*
6 Chris Walsh	6 Cheryl Hardy*
7 Frank Wagner*	7 Bluebell Martin*
S Dom Layfield*	S Emily Dana*
C Heather Balmer	C Sarah Askew

Quite a few new faces in the Men's 1st Torpid. Matt and Ed failed to be deterred by my coaching of last summer's 2nd VIII, and Jerry's also ex-2nd VIII coming back into rowing after a year off, having decided that he's been spending far too much time with his chemicals. Richard is a fresher who's previously rowed at school and Chris is this year's token American, courtesy of Georgetown University. Heather's rise from cox of Women's 3rd VIII to Men's 1st VIII has been assisted by considerable experience with the City of Oxford RC, often as not practising her bumping skills on hapless Sunday-morning scullers (speaking from experience, here). At the moment the Men are being coached by Dan Tollin, Hassan Ahari and Damien West. Hassan's currently being seat-raced for the Oxford Lightweight boat, but our other prospective lightweight, Jon Haynes, has resigned to spend more time with his Boat Club (Osler House, these days, of which he is Captain). Incidentally, these two both ended up stroking the crews in the Lightweight Trials Race. Meanwhile, Damien West continues, and apparently prospers, within the OUBC squad.

The newcomers to the Women's 1st Torpid are Sarah and Anna-Marie from last summer's blade-winning 2nd VIII, and Emily Skor (their token American) and Daljit from last term's Nephthys-winning Novice VIII. One thing that occurs to me is that, With Emily Lloyd currently rowing for OUWBC, and Em Thomas (ex-1st VIII) also active again, we could have a serious surplus of stroke-side Emily's next term. Not having had any great success with the Men, the Rowing Society have decided this year they would pay for a coach for the Women instead: namely Susan Erb, whose voice may be familiar to anyone who's attended Summer Eights in recent years since she's usually the one merrily chatting away over the public-address system. Sarah Jones, their cox from last year, and I also share the coaching, but in a more discreet fashion.

Nowadays there is a whole range of options - depending on the stream level - to determine which Torpids divisions get to race. However, on the assumption that things proceed as 'normal' (i.e. with a slow stream, which hasn't in fact happened since 1992) the Men's 1st VIII will start 10th in Div.1 (5:00), chasing New, pursued by Balliol; and the Women's 1st VIII 5th in Div.1 (4:30), chasing Wadham, pursued by Christ Church. The Men's 2nd Torpid start 8th in Div.4 (2:30) and we have another men's crew and three more women's crews who, if they Row On, will be appearing among the new entries at the bottom of Men's Div.7 (12:30) and Women's Div.4 (12:00).

Just in case, the 1st Torpids are also planning on entering a few Head Races outside Oxford. The first away-fixture should be Burway Head on 17th February. Mind you, this has also been cancelled the past two years due to floods (See! it's not just Oxford rowing). After Torpids, there are plans for the Women to enter the Women's Eights Head and the Men to enter Kingston Head as a means of getting some early preparation in for the summer. I hope this doesn't come as news to those members of the 1st VIIIs reading this.

They way things look at the moment, I might not actually be the Senior Umpire this year (and just as I was getting the hang of the job, too). I've received a higher calling: yep, the youngsters who pass for boatmen nowadays have seen fit to elevate me to the noble - not to mention profitable - Guild of Master-Polemen, so I'd better start practising downing pints in the 20 minutes or so available between races. This seems a good moment to drag up the story about the time when OURCs decided it would be a 'friendly' gesture to set up a tab for the polemen at the Isis Tavern on the last day of Torpids '91. Not wishing to make any accusations, there was a strong whiff of a rumour that the reason Hertford's Men's 1st Torpid ended up in the far bank might just have been connected with the fact that one of the polemen took full advantage of OURCs' generosity. And, of course, the facts that it was I who suggested the OURCs tab and that it was Catz who subsequently benefitted by bumping Hertford in 10 strokes are merely stated as a matter of historical record, and not to imply any premeditation. At least Jim's a reformed character these days, and I hope Hertford will have forgotten all about it before we have to start rubbing shoulders with them in the new boathouse.

Finally I'll draw your attention to the enclosed invitation to the Rowing Society Dinner, to be held in Catz on Saturday of Torpids. James Sergeant is planning on resigning from the Rowing Society Committee due to the pressures of impending fatherhood .... actually, there now follows a brief pause while those of us who still remember James as that noisy, freckly kid in the bow-seat who got the Boat Club block-vote in the 'pushy-fresher award', quietly attempt to reconcile these two images .... anyway, as I was saying, we'll be looking for new blood on the Committee. If you're interested, or want to find out what this entails, phone the Rowing Society Chairman, Richard Peters, on 0181 540 8205 (evenings) before the Dinner & AGM.

Anu Dudhia (e-mail: dudhia@atm.ox.ac.uk)

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