Each year we aim to organise a gathering where we can view the Boat Races on a large screen in company with other Oxonians, glass in hand!
2023
About 25 of us of all ages met at Widcombe Social Club in Bath to watch the 2023 Boat Races , refreshed by drinks from the bar. Sadly, last year’s success wasn’t repeated and the Light Blue supporters we invited along to join us had more to cheer about. However the races were close enough to be interesting and it was fun getting to meet one another!
We hope to repeat the event in 2024, and would like to make it a joint one with Cambridge alumni.
Oxford rowers Buller, Hornby and Warre wrote of the Boat Race over 150 years ago:
…Thus in generous emulation
Cam and Isis both are one;
Thus each passing generation
Earns the meed of duty done;
Thus the glory of our nation
Shines wherever shines the sun.
(I wonder what they would have made of the Women’s Boat Race, or of the very international composition of the Boat Race crews these days?)
2022
We gathered at the King St Brew House in Bristol where we had a downstairs room with a big screen to ourselves, food and access to the bar. (Another smaller group were watching the Boat Races elsewhere in the Brew House but they were predominantly Light Blue….)
The OU women will have to wait another year for a victory, but the men broke the run of losses in recent years with a convincing win, cheered on by us!
2019
Several dozen of us, along with our guests, gathered to watch the 165th Men’s and the 74th Women’s Boat Races at the Marquee at the Bath Brew House.
It wasn’t Oxford’s day and the victors were uniformly light blue for a second year in succession, but we nevertheless enjoyed ourselves, fuelled by the Brew House’s food and drink, and enjoyed meeting new people or deepening existing acquaintances.
We hoped to have a similar event on the day of the 2020 Boat Race, and that Oxford would fare better than in the last two years! [at least Oxford didn’t lose in 2020…]
2018
The Boat Race viewing took place at The Lansdown in Clifton, Bristol on 24 March.
2017
On Sunday 2 April, the OUSoc Bristol & Bath organised a viewing event for the 163rd Oxford–Cambridge Boat Race and the 72nd Women’s Boat Race. The crowd gathered at the Bath Function Rooms to watch the race and cheer on the rowers.
A number of alumni attended the event. Many of them rowed themselves in the past, including Peter Tomlinson of Brasenose College (on the photo). We cheered for the dark blue women’s team after their less than perfect start. We were filled with excitement when Oxford men’s team showed the other place who is the best.
Oxford University Bristol & Bath Alumni 