OXFORD, winners in very heavy weather of this year’s Boat Race, sponsored by business services company Xchanging, will once more brave the elements on the Thames tomorrow at 2.15pm when they race two Eights over the University Course as part of the selection process for the 2007 Boat Race, due to take place on April 7th.

Forecasters predict winds of over 25 mph and heavy rain. Cambridge, meanwhile, could see better conditions when they race their Eights on Friday over the famous Course and for the same purpose.

Coach Sean Bowden will tomorrow have the opportunity to witness his Oxford squad under the pressure of Race conditions, giving him a further idea of who might eventually win the coveted Blue Boat seats.

One of the two Trial Eights crews, dubbed “Hammer”, will be coxed by Nick Brodie, the man who lost his Blue Boat cox’s seat just weeks before last year’s Race to Seb Pearce.

Brodie’s crew includes new faces Paul Kelly and Lucas Dalglish. Both have won GB U23 honours already. Dalglish was born in Hammersmith and lives in Kew whilst Scottish-born Kelly is an apprentice Thames Waterman.

Hammer will also have three new Americans on board. Matthew Brown, undertaking sports science studies, is a former Yale strokeman whilst Magnus Fleming, studying for a Masters in Nature, Society & the Environment, won several American Collegiate titles whilst at the University of California, Berkeley, and Adam Kosmicki is a former American junior international. They are joined by former Polish U23 international Michal Plotkowiak.

The opposition, named “Sickle”, will be stroked by Croatian international Ante Kusurin, and will feature this year’s Oxford President, Robin Ejsmond-Frey – the man who was born in Hammersmith and went to school in Barnes, two of The Race’s more famous bridges.

Ejsmond-Frey’s line-up includes seven newcomers to the Oxford scene including Nicholas Marriott whose great-great grandfather played cricket for England and Richard Chambers, a piano-player and skilled golfer who has come through rowing’s world-class start programme since taking up the sport in 2004.

“We have a lot of newcomers this season”, said Coach Sean Bowden recently. “It’s an interesting project blending them all together”.

Duncan Holland the Cambridge coach, meanwhile, has a mixture of returning Blues as well as new faces, some from the University’s development squad, in his line-ups for his second year in the coaching seat.

Kieran West will stroke one of Friday’s eights for Cambridge. The former GB Olympic gold medallist is in the second year of PhD studies at Cambridge but rowed for the Light Blues in the Boat Race both in 2006 and when he was an undergraduate.

2006/7 Cambridge President Tom James, a GB Olympian and three-times already a Blue as an engineering undergraduate, takes the five-seat in the opposing crew which has returning Blue Kip McDaniel in the seven-seat and is stroked by returning 2006 Blue and world champion Thorsten Engelmann from Germany.

Engelmann’s compatriot, fellow world champion and returning Blue Sebastian Schulte will take the seven-seat in West’s boat which features British undergraduate Oli de Groot who took a year out from the sport to box for Cambridge but is also a former Cambridge squad member.

Alastair Macleod is one of the rowers to emerge into contention from the development squad. His father, Jamie, was a British Olympic rower. “We’ve got four or five lads who are emerging from the development squad this season and we’re very pleased with their progress”, said coach Holland recently.

Another new name to watch might be Tobias Garnett, a languages student. He is a former GB junior squad member whose great uncle Kenneth Garnett was a Boat Race winner with Cambridge in 1914 but then went on to fight and die in the First World War.

Rebecca Dowbiggin, an undergraduate student of Anglo-Saxon, Norse & Celtic, coxes one of the crews whilst Russell Glenn, previously of Goldie (2005 & 6) takes the steering seat in the other.

Oxford won the 2006 Boat Race – their second victory in a row – but Cambridge lead the series overall by 78-73 since 1829. The 2007 Race will be the 153rd in the Race’s history.

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