Andy Hodge, Peter Reed, Colin Smith, Tom James and Kieran West head a list of very recent Oxford and Cambridge Blues who have been named by Great Britain in their final squad for the World Rowing Championships which start a week today at Dorney Lake, Eton, and run until 27th August.

Reed and Hodge, from the 2005 Oxford-winning Boat Race vintage, form 50% of the British men’s four with Alex Partridge and Olympic champion Steve Williams. The quartet remains undefeated since early 2005 and the four men are the defending World Champions.

Smith and James featured in the weather-beaten 2006 Boat Race, sponsored by Xchanging. Within weeks they needed to bury their intense rivalry, though, to train and compete in a pair which was fast enough in Lucerne, at the world cup finals last month, to take a silver medal and pressurise the reigning world champions from New Zealand.

James, from the King’s School Chester and originally from Wales, has alos recently been elected as Oxford President for the 2006/7 season.

West, Olympic gold medalist in 2000 in the eight, was in the Cambridge 2006 Boat Race crew. As a previous President of Cambridge, he is one of Great Britain’s more experienced rowers and will race in the eight.

That eight is coxed by twice Boat Race winning cox, Acer Nethercott, of Oxford and includes former Cambridge blues Tom Stallard (now at stroke) and Josh West.

Tom Parker and Seb Pearce, both from the 2006 Oxford winning combination, have been named in the Great Britain coxed four for Eton.

James Orme, formerly of CUBC, and Charlie Palmer, from Goldie in 2006, have been named as reserves.

A quick glance across the international entries shows another quality list of Oxford and Cambridge Blues.

Mike Blomquist, winner with Oxford in 2005, is in the American four so will compete against his former team-mates Reed and Hodge. Canada’s Scott Frandsen, in this event, is also a former Oxford Blue and will row with 2006 Oxford President, Barney Williams.

Bastien Ripoll, stroke of the 2006 Oxford boat, forms part of the engine of the men’s eight for France. Cambridge’s 2006 Kip McDaniel strokes the Canadian eight whilst the German eight features former Cambridge Blues Sebastian Schulte, Thorsten Engelmann and Bernd Heidicker.

Heats of the World Championships begin on Sunday 20th August at 9.30am (UK summertime) The finals are on Saturday 26th and Sunday 27th August. The event will be televised on BBC TV from Thursday 24th - Sunday 27th. Boat Race fans can also tune in via FISA’s live "race-tracker" at www.worldrowing.com in the days before this.