Canada’s version of the Boat Race — the fabled rowing eights match race between Oxford and Cambridge universities along the Thames — took place along the Gorge Saturday.
The University of Victoria Vikes won the women’s Brown Cup race against the University of British Columbia Thunderbirds, while the T-Birds turned the tables in beating the Vikes for the men’s Brown Cup.
Both programs, especially UVic’s, have produced numerous Olympians and several Olympic medallists over the years.
“This is bigger than the national championships for us because UVic and UBC are the two best university rowing programs in the country, so there’s a lot of history to this race,” said UVic women’s captain Larissa McKinlay.
UVic women’s head coach Barney Williams, an Olympic silver medallist, was also a two-time winner of the Boat Race with Oxford, once as captain.
“We channelled Mike Spracklen,” Williams said, referring to the legendary Elk Lake coach, who guided Canadian crews to two Olympic gold medals, two Olympic silvers and a bronze, and eight world championship medals.
“Mike’s legacy still lives on this city,” said Williams, who rowed under Spracklen.
The Vikes women were certainly ready, completing the 3.6-kilometre race in 11 minutes, 41.35 seconds to UBC’s 11:50.44.
“Barney prepared us well for the race,” McKinlay said.
The Vikes women have been dominant and are 24-3 in Brown Cup races against the Thunderbirds, although UBC has had recent success with two of its victories coming in 2014 and 2017.
“We trained like underdogs and then we executed a perfect race,” Williams said. “We were agile when we needed to be. We bent, but didn’t break.”
The conditions along the Gorge were perfect.
“The water was beautiful and glassy,” McKinlay said.
The UVic men, with a crew dotted with rowers who have represented Canada at the world championships in the junior and U-23 levels, were after their fourth consecutive victory over UBC in the 28th edition of the men’s Brown Cup race, but were denied.
“This is the Canadian [version of the] Boat Race with the premier rowing schools in the country,” UVic captain Alec Stapff said. “We fought and fought and fought, and there’s not a guy in our boat who didn’t give it his all, but UBC was the better boat today.”
UBC crossed 07.13 seconds ahead of the Vikes. UVic leads the overall men’s series 20-8 over the T-Birds.
The Thunderbirds won both the men’s and women's reserves races, held before the varsity races.
