Thames Rowing Club

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Thames Rowing Club is based on the River Thames in Putney, London, United Kingdom and was founded in 1860. The club's colours are red, white and black in stripes, the white stripe lying between the red and black and being of half their width.

Contents 1 Current position 2 History 3 Winning crews at Henley Royal Regatta 4 Olympians 5 See also 6 External links

[edit] Current position

Of the three grand British rowing clubs (along with Leander Club and London Rowing Club), Thames has the largest active rowing membership and is the only one to welcome complete beginners. It has over 800 members, of which around 200 are in training for competition. Of these, approximately 60% are women, and almost 20% represent veteran oarsmen and women.

Thames is recognised by the UK Amateur Rowing Association as a High Performance Centre for women's rowing, with a programme to help top club rowers reach the British national squad.

Thames has links with several local schools, of which Putney High School is the largest, to encourage junior rowing and attract young people into the sport. The junior programme is becoming increasingly successful, with juniors competing at many levels in the sport.

As at July 2006, Thames had won events at Henley Royal Regatta 73 times including the Wyfold Challenge Cup for men's coxless fours in 2006 and the Remenham Challenge Cup for women's eights in 2005.

The Thames RC clubhouse, situated on Putney Embankment is a treasure house of rowing history. In 2005, the club opened a large new building, named in memory of former Club President and benefactor Alan Burrough CBE, which provides extensive training facilities and boat storage.

Thames is one of the Founding Clubs of Remenham Club.

[edit] History

In 1860, the City of London Rowing Club was founded at Putney by a small group of men, chiefly clerks and salesmen in the city rag trade. They based themselves at Simmons Boathouse and a room at the Red Lion Hotel and their initial aim was the modest one of ‘organised pleasure or exercise rowing’. It would be 1864 (by which time the club’s name had been changed to Thames Rowing Club) before a growing interest in competition led to the club’s first recorded win, in a race against the Excelsior Boat Club of Greenwich.

In 1870 the Club won at Henley Royal Regatta for the first time, taking the Wyfold Challenge Cup from the Oscillators Club of Surbiton and the Oxford Etonians in a race that, according to the Rowing Almanack, was ‘a pretty hollow affair, the Thames crew winning as they pleased from first to last.’ Over the next twenty years, Thames’ had its first great flowering, with 22 wins at Henley by 1890, including four victories in the most prestigious event, the Grand Challenge Cup for eights. With the completion of a spacious clubhouse on Putney Embankment in 1879, Thames was established as a mainstay of amateur rowing.

This early period was the time of the great Victorian amateur. Many Thames members were keen on all sports and the club itself also had an influence beyond rowing: From 1866, Thames organised cross-country races around Wimbledon Common and Richmond Park as part of the oarsmen’s winter training. These are generally accepted as the first open cross-country events to have taken place in Britain. One eventual result was the foundation of the Thames Hare and Hounds, the first cross-country club, which would itself go on to an illustrious history and an important role in the birth of the Amateur Athletics Association.

Another addition to rowing training was boxing, with a ring frequently set up in the hall at the clubhouse. George Vize, a member of five winning crews at Henley, became amateur heavyweight champion of Britain in 1878 and a founder member of the Amateur Boxing Association. Boxing finally disappeared after the First World War, when the great coach Steve Fairbairn wound it up because of the damage caused to oarsmen’s hands.

Fairbairn was an Australian graduate of Cambridge, with boundless charisma and innovative (and highly controversial) views on training and technique. He was one of the major influences on the club and on the sport in general, becoming generally accepted as the father of modern rowing. Under his tutelage in the 1920s, and that of Julius Beresford, Thames reached new heights, winning four events at Henley in both 1927 and 1928, something which no one club has replicated in the 20th century.

At the same time, Thames was home to Britain’s greatest ever single sculler. Jack Beresford took Silver at the 1920 Amsterdam Olympics in an epic race with Jack Kelly, before going one better with Gold at Paris in 1924. He won the Diamond Sculls at Henley four times and the Wingfield Sculls for the Amateur championship of Great Britain a record seven times. Then, with Thames crews, he took three further Olympic medals: Silver in the eight in Antwerp, 1928, Gold in the coxless four in Los Angeles, 1932 and Gold in the double scull in Berlin, 1936. It would be 60 years before Steve Redgrave bettered his record.

In 1972, Thames became one of the first British rowing clubs to admit women and rapidly became the powerhouse of women's rowing, a position it retains to this day. Thames women have represented Great Britain at every Olympic Games since Los Angeles; most recently Elise Laverick won Bronze in the double scull at the Athens Olympics in 2004 and sisters Guin Batten and Miriam Batten won Silver in the quadruple scull at the Sydney Olympics. Since the founding of Henley Women's Regatta in 1987, the Club has won there 39 times.

[edit] Winning crews at Henley Royal Regatta

The following Thames crews (including composites) were winners at Henley Royal Regatta:

Year Event 1870 Wyfold Challenge Cup 1871 Wyfold Challenge Cup 1872 Thames Challenge Cup 1872 Wyfold Challenge Cup 1873 Thames Challenge Cup 1874 Thames Challenge Cup 1875 Wyfold Challenge Cup 1876 Grand Challenge Cup 1877 Silver Goblets and Nickalls' Challenge Cup 1878 Grand Challenge Cup 1880 Silver Goblets and Nickalls' Challenge Cup 1880 Stewards' Challenge Cup 1881 Silver Goblets and Nickalls' Challenge Cup 1883 Stewards' Challenge Cup 1884 Wyfold Challenge Cup 1886 Stewards' Challenge Cup 1886 Wyfold Challenge Cup 1888 Grand Challenge Cup 1888 Wyfold Challenge Cup 1889 Grand Challenge Cup 1889 Stewards' Challenge Cup 1890 Thames Challenge Cup 1891 Stewards' Challenge Cup 1893 Thames Challenge Cup 1894 Stewards' Challenge Cup

Year Event 1894 Wyfold Challenge Cup 1898 Silver Goblets and Nickalls' Challenge Cup 1899 Diamond Challenge Sculls 1905 Thames Challenge Cup 1908 Wyfold Challenge Cup 1909 Stewards' Challenge Cup 1911 Silver Goblets and Nickalls' Challenge Cup 1911 Stewards' Challenge Cup 1912 Silver Goblets and Nickalls' Challenge Cup 1919 Fawley Cup 1920 Diamond Challenge Sculls 1920 Thames Challenge Cup 1920 Wyfold Challenge Cup 1922 Wyfold Challenge Cup 1923 Grand Challenge Cup 1924 Diamond Challenge Sculls 1925 Diamond Challenge Sculls 1925 Wyfold Challenge Cup 1926 Diamond Challenge Sculls 1926 Stewards' Challenge Cup 1927 Grand Challenge Cup 1927 Stewards' Challenge Cup 1927 Thames Challenge Cup 1927 Wyfold Challenge Cup 1928 Grand Challenge Cup

Year Event 1928 Silver Goblets and Nickalls' Challenge Cup 1928 Stewards' Challenge Cup 1928 Thames Challenge Cup 1929 Silver Goblets and Nickalls' Challenge Cup 1929 Wyfold Challenge Cup 1931 Wyfold Challenge Cup 1932 Stewards' Challenge Cup 1934 Thames Challenge Cup 1939 Centenary Double Sculls 1947 Stewards' Challenge Cup 1948 Grand Challenge Cup 1948 Stewards' Challenge Cup 1949 Silver Goblets and Nickalls' Challenge Cup 1951 Stewards' Challenge Cup 1952 Stewards' Challenge Cup 1955 Wyfold Challenge Cup 1956 Stewards' Challenge Cup 1999 Women's Invitation Eights 2002 Women's Quadruple Sculls 2003 Wyfold Challenge Cup 2004 Remenham Challenge Cup 2005 Remenham Challenge Cup 2006 Wyfold Challenge Cup

[edit] Olympians

The following Thames members have represented Great Britain at the Olympic Games:

Paris 1900 Name Event Result St George Ashe Single Scull Stockhom 1912 Name Event Result Julius Beresford Coxed Four Silver Geoffrey Carr Coxed Four Silver Bruce Logan Coxed Four Silver Charles Rought Coxed Four Silver Karl Vernon Coxed Four Silver Paris 1920 Name Event Result Jack Beresford Single Scull Silver Antwerp 1924 Name Event Result Reginald Bare Eight Jack Beresford Single Scull Gold C.G. Chandler Eight H.C. Debenham Eight Hugh Dulley Eight Ian Fairbairn Eight Jack Godwin Eight G.C. (Bill) Killick Coxless Pair Bronze A.F. Long Eight H. Morphy Eight Charles Rew Eight Cyril Southgate Coxless Pair Bronze Amsterdam 1928 Name Event Result J.C.(Felix) Badcock Eight Silver Jack Beresford Eight Silver Jamie Hamilton Eight Silver G.C. (Bill) Killick Eight Silver Donald Gollan Eight Silver H.M. Lane Eight Silver Gully Nickalls Eight Silver Arthur Sulley Eight Silver H.E. West Eight Silver Los Angeles 1932 Name Event Result J.C.(Felix) Badcock Coxless Four Gold Jack Beresford Coxless Four Gold Hugh Edwards Coxless Four Gold Rowland George Coxless Four Gold L.F. (Dick) Southwood Single Scull Berlin 1936 Name Event Result Jack Beresford Double Scull Gold L.F. (Dick) Southwood Double Scull Gold London 1948 Name Event Result Tony Butcher Coxless Four Tom Christie Coxless Four Jack Dearlove Eight Silver Bakie James Coxed Pair Peter Kirkpatrick Coxless Four Hank Rushmere Coxless Four Mark Scott Coxed Pair

Helsinki 1952 Name Event Result Peter de Giles Coxed Four Graham Fisk Coxed Four Lawrence Guest Coxed Four R.A.F. (John) Macmillan Coxed Four Paul Massey Coxed Four Melbourne 1956 Name Event Result Alan Watson Eight Tokyo 1964 Name Event Result John James Coxless Four Moscow 1980 Name Event Result Malcolm McGowan Eight Silver John Pritchard Eight Silver Los Angeles 1984 Name Event Result Sarah Hunter Jones Women’s Eight Malcolm McGowan Eight Tessa Millar Women’s Coxed Four John Pritchard Eight Seoul 1988 Name Event Result Sally Andrea Women’s Double Scull Barcelona 1992 Name Event Result Miriam Batten Women’s Double Scull Dot Blackie Women’s Eight Katie Brownlow Women’s Eight Phillippa Cross Women’s Eight Atlanta 1996 Name Event Result Guin Batten Women's Single Scull Miriam Batten Women's Eight Dot Blackie Women's Eight Phillippa Cross Women's Pair Susie Ellis Women's Eight Kate Mackenzie Women's Coxless Pair Kate Pollitt Women's Eight Annamarie Stapleton Women's Eight Sydney 2000 Name Event Result Guin Batten Women's Quadruple Scull Silver Miriam Batten Women's Quadruple Scull Silver Dot Blackie Women's Coxless Pair Elise Laverick Women's Eight Kate Mackenzie Women's Eight Alison Mowbray Women's Single Scull Athens 2004 Name Event Result Elise Laverick Women’s Double Scull Bronze

[edit] See also

• Leander Club
• London Rowing Club
• Imperial College Boat Club

[edit] External links

• Thames Rowing Club official website