Any freshers coming up to Oxford inspired by GB's rowing success at the Paris Olympics and hoping to jump straight into a boat will instead have found themselves sat on an ergometer, made to undertake a swim test and, at best, giving the water of the Iffley Rd rowing tank a vigorous stirring with an oar blade full of holes.

Acknowledging the lack of experience of most coxes following a year of almost continual flooding, OURCs now offers some very literal guidance at the start of IWL races.

RQ (yep, still going strong) getting racing underway in today's IWL.

On the other hand, now that novices are finally allowed on the water, the delay may have been beneficial in weeding out those who just wanted a selfie in a boat for their Instagram (I'm pretending I know what some of these words mean). Novice rowers, that is. Anyone wanting to try coxing will have to wait until the river drops further.

We're now at the end of 3rd week and today was the first of the intercollege events, IWL-A. However, with barely a week of water time there weren't many entries, and none from Catz, so no results to report.

Instead we take a historical diversion and look at the events of 100 years ago. While St Catherine's could not compete with Balliol in terms of hereditary celebrity, two of our oarsmen went on to distinguish themselves through their own efforts.

And finally the annual review. Last year, presenting the 2022/23 review, I think I might have implied 'things could only get better'. Well, about that ...

St Catherine's Magazine, MT1924

We were obliged to abandon the idea of coming up a fortnight early, but we got in a week if training before term. Subsequently we scrapped the old ship and got into a streamlined craft, the identical boat that had won the Ladies' Plate [at Henley] last year. We achieved nothing but in a year remarkable for its man shortages we have checked the downward precipitation.

St Catherine's Magazine, HT1925

When Virgil 'came up' in the Michaelmas term, presumably in the year of the Great Frost, he was so struck by the spirit of abandon with which Oxford throws itself into the chief business of the first term of the year that he wrote:

Natos ad flumina primum
deferimus, sævoque gelu duramus et undis

[We send our children to the river, and temper them with ice and waves' (Virgil, Aeneid, ix.603)]

We still keep up this tradition. As three out of five 'Eights' men were suffering from Schools we could not hold the sliding seat pair races which are occasional. So we gave those newly born to Oxford life our undivided attention. Two old Togger [Torpids] men were happily available to help us. At first the freshers were rather disappointing. Those who did not fail to turn up seemed oversensitive about disturbing the water. This was aggravated by our inadvertently dropping two men in the river and so completely upsetting their 'aqua'-librium.

The Daily Telegraph, Thu 19 Feb 1925

The Torpid races commence at Oxford to-day, the Third Division starting at half-past two [...]. The Crown Prince of Norway is rowing in the Balliol II crew, and the Emir Zeid [future head of the Royal House of Iraq] in their third.

The Times, Fri 20 Feb 1925

The Oxford University Torpid Races were begun yesterday between Iffley and Salter's Barge. Considering the unfavourable weather, there was quite a good attendance of spectators. The boats competing number 36 and the races are rowed in three divisions. The river is almost bank high and the current, against which the crews had to contend the entire distance, was very strong. There was some exciting racing and in the three divisions ten bumps were made.

The Times, Mon 25 May 1925

Some mention should be made of the St. Catherine's crew, who are quite easily the best in the Third Division, and are likely to reach the Second Division, a position which they have not occupied for very many years, if at all [actually 1923]. They bumped a good Brasenose II crew, containing three school eights men, and are rowing in a manner in which one rarely sees displayed so low on the river.

St Catherine's Magazine, MT1925

Our first eight was an experiment. Two of its component parts had never rowed on slides previously. However, the experiment succeeded and gave rise to others. During the following two weeks we tried no fewer than nine combinations.

Our first Weir's Bridge [timed piece to a towpath bridge, close to the present Donnington Bridge] took alarmingly long. But this stimulated the old Togger feeling. In one day we reduced our time by 5½ seconds. We also rowed the course in 6 min 56 seconds, the first recorded time that St Cath's have done it under 7 mins, 0 seconds. The actual races were similar to Toggers. We made four bumps and should have made more.

George Peel Gilmour (1900–1963)

(no.3 in the 1925 Torpid and Eight). He studied at McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario, followed by post-graduate work at Yale and Oxford. Returning to McMaster as a history professor, he served as Chancellor from 1941–49 and then President until 1961. He was named Citizen of the Year by the City of Hamilton in 1950, and collected a further 8 honorary degrees.

Joseph T Weingold (1904–1987)

(no.4 in the 1925 Eight, and no.3 the following year). 'Jerry' was born in New York City and received a Bachelor's degree in literature from Oxford followed by a law degree from Columbia. He practised law from 1929–1950. As the father of a son with Down's syndrome, he became President of the NYC chapter of the Association for the Help of Retarded Children (nowadays just 'AHRC') and remained a strong advocate for the rights of those with intellectual disabilities, eventually forcing a change in US legislation.

Michaelmas Term had started normally enough. Our senior rowers competed in the first IWL race of the season, which demonstrated how much training would be required if they were to become competitive in bumps. Then it started raining, leading to the cancellation of Autumn Fours, Nephthys and the Michaelmas Novice Regattas. The flow eased-off just enough for one more IWL to be held at the start of 8th week, but this attracted few entries (and none from Catz).

The new year brought flooding to the attention of the wider Oxford public when the river spilled across the Abingdon Rd, for the first time in 10 years. The Boat Club joined with several others for a day-trip to Dorney Lake but then it was back to land-training. There was a brief respite at the start of February during which IWL-D was scheduled. Catz women managed to get a crew together although the results showed that, if anything, they had lost ground to the other crews.

Fastest Catz VIIIs in IWL Races
Date	Event	Men		Women
		Pos	Time	Pos	Time
2022–23
5th Feb	IWL-D	9th	+33.0s	5th	+19.5s
30th Apr	ISL-A	3rd	+16.5s	8th	+21.5s
2023–24
20th Oct	IWL-A	15th	+64.0s	9th	+25.0s
4th Feb	IWL-D			18th	+37.0s
28th Apr	ISL-A	11th	+56.5s	12th	+49.5s
'Time' is difference from winning time
Best performance 2022–24 shown in bold

Then the rain returned, enough to make it the wettest Oxford February on record and inevitably, also to some relief in certain quarters, Torpids was cancelled a full week before it was due to start.

There were two Catz students in the December Trial VIIIs races, one heavyweight and one lightweight (plus an alumna in the Cambridge races). One was selected for Isis and the other for the lightweight crew, but both lost their races against Cambridge. Oxford had been favourites for the heavyweight races but ended up only winning the Osiris-Blondie race (although that was an improvement considering Cambridge's clean sweep the previous year). The flooding took some of the blame; for restricting Oxford's training and a suggestion that illness within the OUBC squad may have been due to the resulting poor water quality.

Moving onto Trinity Term, the stream was still high, but rowable and a scratch Men's/alumni VIII entered City Bumps at the start of term, even registering a couple of bumps. The regular 1st Eights entered ISL a week later, although those results were less reassuring.

A novice men's 2nd Eight was added bringing the Catz entry for Summer Eights up to three crews, but still our lowest entry since the single-sex days of 1973. Eights did not go well: both men's boats were bumped every day and the women on 3 days. The men's 1st Eight lost their place in the 1st Division, where they had been since 2017, and are now at their lowest position since 1998.

Catz Crews: Current Positions
(& highest–lowest positions, 2015–2024)
	Men		Women
	2024	Range	2024	Range
Torpids positions carried over from 2023
1st Torpid	9th	(3–9)	29th	(8–29)
2nd Torpid	42nd	(33–47)	64th	(48–64)
3rd Torpid			—	(60–63)
1st Eight	16th	(9–16)	22nd	(14–24)
2nd Eight	48th	(42–49)	66th	(51–74)
3rd Eight	—	(56–89)	—	(75–79)
4th Eight	—	(88–91)

Overall, then, a year to forget. Although, hopefully, not before the causes of the poor performance have been identified and corrected.

St Catherine's drop from 14th down to 17th, which is where we were in 2015 (that being a low point, having dropped from 11th the previous year). We're currently just below L.M.H. and ahead of Merton. Our men's 1st VIII will be starting both Torpids and Eights next year chasing Merton, and the women's 1st Eight will be chasing L.M.H., but with Merton directly behind.

Christ Church remain top, with Headships in Men's Torpids and Women's Torpids, and 2nd on the river in Men's Eights. While Oriel held the men's Eights headship, their women's 1st Eight went down 4 so, as a college, Wolfson overtake them and move up to 2nd. A common feature of these top three colleges is the total number of crews in Torpids and Eights: Wolfson have 15, Oriel 12 and Christ Church 11. Catz by contrast have 7.

St Benet's Hall having now been wound up, their position on the river (along with some of their equipment and rowers) are taken by the new graduate college, Reuben.

Crews at the finish of today's IWL.