St Catharine's College Boat Club

So Bumps has come to an end again, with a punchy and powerful performance in a fun but ultimately unsuccessful contest against Churchill M1.  We pushed hard, but technically were far from our best, and Churchill slowly gained on us all the way.  Their first whistles were optimistic, but by first post corner they were beginning to creep up on us, and after an exciting race down Plough Reach the 'bump' (which was actually a blade clash as we took the outside line around Ditton and they kept the racing line, coming up alongside us for a few tense seconds) happened at the beginning of the Long Reach.  Still, we stuck it out for a long time and can hold our heads high.  This crew will all still be here next year, so plenty of opportunities for revenge then!

The final day of May Bumps 2016 would prove to be an emotional one for many, but particularly for W2. We were excited and positive after yesterday’s bump. We knew it was going to be the toughest day yet…but we couldn’t have predicted what was going to happen. We were once again chasing Jesus W3, and this time being followed by Selwyn W2, who we caught yesterday.

We thought Selwyn would be bumped quickly and that any pressure from behind would be from Clare Hall W1 (on for blades), attempting an overbump. We had chased Jesus W3 earlier in the week, and several of us had been in the crew that they had bumped on the last day of Lents. Realistically we had nothing to lose and were full of energy from the highs of the week. We set off well, chasing them down quicker than we expected, and by first post corner our cox had called ‘the kill call’, we had “considerable overlap”, and then came the bump…twice. Our bank party saw it and bow pair felt it, but the Jesus cox didn’t concede and they kept going. Confused as to what had happened, and why the umpire hadn’t called it, we rowed on. Exhausted and confused we were eventually bumped on the long reach by Clare Hall.

Pulling over, we were told the distressing news: we’d bumped but it hadn’t been seen by the umpire or conceded by Jesus and therefore didn’t count. After long conversations with the people in charge, showing photographs on a small phone screen we were told “you can’t prove contact from a photograph, and unless the photograph is square on to the boats they won’t accept bow-ball passed the cox”.

Going down three places in the tables after one row over and two bumps is soul destroying, for all involved. I don’t think any of us will forget in a hurry how cruel bumps can be, but it will give us the fight to come back next year. The energy, passion, spirit, and the hard work of W2 is evident from the speed at which we bumped a crew who admittedly were better than us in Lent Term. I could not be prouder to write this race report on behalf of a group of girls I truly admire. FTW!

There are half a dozen 'could haves' and 'would haves' I could mention, but ultimately none of them make any difference.  Because Bumps is Bumps there can be crews all round that you are competitive against, and you can never get a chance to match up against any of them.  It took Magdalene about twice as long as Selwyn, but the bump was inevitable; at least thanks to intelligent coxing on both sides there was no damage done and we were able to clear in time for the crews behind to race through unobstructed.  On Saturday Magdalene will undoubtedly take out King's quickly and leave us nothing to chase, but we expect a good race with Churchill and are looking forward to the challenge.

Bumps is usually fun, but rarely fair and sometimes brutal.  Today we should have had a chance to bump back on Emma, with a slow Christ's crew behind us offering no threat and if no bump today a good chance on King's tomorrow.  Unfortunately, however, on Day One Selwyn managed to get an overbump, almost unheard of in First Division, on Christ's, and catapulted themselves up the table to just behind us.  We weren't too worried, because Selwyn talk a lot but rarely back it up with results, and we knew we could improve on yesterday's row.  But on this occasion we should have been worried; Selwyn were obviously scared of Magdalene behind them, and set off like a rocket for a 'fly or die' attempt.  We didn't even have a chance to respond and were bumped just after the motorway bridge.  Worst of all, although our concession was instantaneous Selwyn completely failed to hold it up and caused significant damage to our boat, not in the initial bump, but 5-10 seconds later when they still hadn't tried to stop, as well as shunting our bow pair deep into the overhanging thorn bushes.  We're just glad no one was hurt.