Challenging Ole Man Charles

The Charles River, full of wide turns, bridges and dozens of boats, may well claim the pride of at least one coxswain tomorrow.

The coxes in the Head of the Charles face the challenges of steering the shortest possible course, intimidating other boats, their coxes, and avoiding crashes and clashes.

Because the 40 boats in each event have to pass in tight spaces, coxes do not always use their best judgement, says Jerry Olrich, a member of the Head-of-the-Charles Committee, who has rowed in all 20 regattas. "Sometimes in the heat of battle, you just try to do your damnedest."

Bruce Beall, who coached Harvard lightweights for five years, and now coaches heavyweights at MIT says, "Because of the corners, because of the passing involved, the coxswain's role in this particular event is really important. What kind of day the coxswains have quite often will determine what kind of day the crew will have.

"The coxswains get very stubborn about yielding, and course marshalls are starting to disqualify crews for that."

Linda Buchin, a member of the Cambridge Boat Club who will be coxing her tenth Head this year, says "In the Head several times in the past, I've been in situations where a boat wouldn't move out of my way. After shouting at them, 'Move out of my way. If you don't move out of my way I'm going to row right through you,' I started bumping the bow of my boat into the stern of their boat, and I forced them to move over."

And the list goes on. Olrich recalled one incident when the Vesper Boat Club, Dartmouth and MIT were trying to pass each other to get through a tight space. "They were poking oars at each other like lances in an effort to ward off oncoming boats," Olrich says. "Even if they had wanted to give way there was no room."

Sometimes accidents can result from inanimate obstacles as well. The Eliot Bridge is a perennial site for accidents, because coxes refuse to yield to each other and have trouble steering in the melee of boats. "Inexperienced coxes and inexperienced boats don't always make the turn, and they either lose time or crack up," Olrich says.

About ten years ago, the Mount Herman Academy crew and their coach Charles Hamilton came up to Cambridge to row in the youth eights. "The first boat to come through lost three oars when they hit the abutment of the middle arch," Olrich says. "Then the second boat hit the arch and it hobbled to the finish. By that time Charlie Hamilton couldn't look anymore, and sure enough the third boat hit, too.

"It's impossible to explain how Charlie Hamilton looked with his head in his hands. The only three crews to hit that day were his three. He went back and built a mock arch out of wood in the Connecticut River for his crews to practice with."

Radcliffe novice Coach Holly Hatton recalls one classic catastrophe from several years ago. "Two crews had come from out of town. One was racing and one was launching from Magazine Beach. As the one that was launching came out, the racing boat skewered it, cutting right through and coming out on the other side."

Avoiding accidents is only part of the battle, however. The Head is a great opportunity for coxes to show their ability to win through intimidation and steering skill.

Talking Tough

"One crew has a speaker mounted on the bow directed outward at other boats so the cox can do audio-intimidation in a big way," Hatton says.

Olrich says the committee tries to slot the boats to minimize passing, so the boats expected to be fastest start first. It is impossible, however, to predict the performance of different boats from year to year, which can make for some wild racing as faster boats in the rear of the field make their way up through the higher seeds.

"The difficulty with coxing this particular race is in being able to overtake other boats in the shortest distance without creating clashes of oars or boat collisions," says Leigh Weiss '88, cox for Radcliffe heavyweights. "To be able to steer the straightest possible course given all the curves in the river can make a tremendous difference in a boat's time.

"They start boats several seconds apart and obviously you try to overtake boats in going for a faster time. Oars collide and sometimes boats collide," Weiss says. "Home crews have an advantage, especially if they are familiar with the river.

"The Charles is a tough river to steer on. The course is fairly specific and there are bouys on the Boston shoreline to indicate where a boat cannot go."

But she doesn't seem too worried. "I will be coxing the U.S. Lightweight Development Camp boat, which will be starting first in our event. I hope and expect that we'll have no trouble maintaining that position," Weiss adds.

Olrich now rows in the veterans category. At 72, he says his long-term participation in the Head is "not an unusual thing." He says that of some 300 participants in the original regatta, at least 50 are still doing it.

"Many people stand on the Eliot Bridge and look for a tragedy, and when something like one of these crashes happens, it is a tragedy," Olrich says. "People put a lot of stock in their races."

Hatton has a lighter outlook on the mishaps. "It is a festive atmosphere, but the racing is pretty intense. There's not a lot of laughter while you're rowing, but there's a lot afterwards."