the tideway

The tideway, which is what they call the racecourse for the boatrace, is hands down the worst piece of water I have ever rowed on.  If you combined the worst part of every place I have ever rowed, you would get the tideway.  It has the floating condoms and hypodermic syringes of Ballona Creek in Los Angeles, it has the bendiness of the corkscrew at Redwood city, it has the traffic of the Charles.  The worst wind conditions at Port of Redwood city are an average day on the tideway.  Add to that english weather.  Add to that the ripping tidal currents which reverse 4 times a day.  Add to that the fact that the brits thought it was a good idea to change traffic patterns with every tide.  Put all of these things together, and you get the tideway.  

It think the austerity of the racecourse has a lot to do with the prominence, and with the collective obsession in the race held by its participants.  It is not a fair course, but neither is there any way to cheat at it.

I got a chance to see the racecourse a training trip to the tideway in London for three days.  I stayed with two other teammates (Shane O'mara and Rob Wietemeyer) at a really nice house near central london.  It is funny that in a rowing program which competes in front of millions of spectators, has 6 paid support staff, and has two boathouses, athletes are still expected to find their own accommodation for training.  In many ways, Stanford rowing is better funded than Cambridge Boat Club, despite the latter's higher profile.  Regardless, it was really nice to stay in an actual house with an actual family.  I'll write more about the rowing culture when I get a chance.