HoRR

The Head of the River Race (HoRR) was founded by Steve Fairbairn, the Cambridge and Tideway oarsman, in order to give crews something to aim for at the end of the winter training period. It is rowed over the 4 mile Thames Championship Course from Mortlake to Putney (i.e. the Boat Race course in reverse) and is usually held on the third or fourth Sa... turday in March, depending on the tides. The first race was held in 1926 and 21 crews took part. There was no race in 1937 (there was no suitable tide on a Saturday and no competitive sport took place on Sundays at that time) and none from 1940-45 inclusive, but the race was restarted in 1946 and has taken place annually ever since. What started as an event for Tideway crews has grown steadily until it now attracts crews from all over the British Isles and beyond. The largest non- British contingent is usually from Germany but, over the years, crews have come from Australia, Austria, Belgium, China, Denmark, France, Ireland, Italy, the Netherlands, Portugal, Russia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and the USA. As the race is rowed on a falling (ebb) tide, this reduces the space available for marshalling beforehand and when, in 1978, the total entry passed 400 for the first time, the organisers felt obliged for safety reasons to impose an overall limit of 420. If more entries than this are received, a draw has to be held to bring the numbers down to the agreed limit. The race is processional; that is, crews start one behind the other at 10-second intervals, the winner being the crew which returns the fastest time. The previous years winner starts first, followed by the other finishers in time order and then by new entries in alphabetical order within their classifications. Some overseas crews which are predicted to be fast are inserted higher up the start order for safetys sake. The race takes approximately two hours from the time that the first crew starts to the last crew finishing. The average time taken for the course used to be between 19 and 20 minutes but this has ...Read More