Words: Tom Ransley MBE

Last year the Tideway ran Light Blue as Cambridge continued their domination of The Boat Race. On the tenth anniversary of the Women’s Boat Race moving to The Championship Course, the Cambridge women held their nerve after wayward steering from Oxford caused a violent clash of blades and a dramatic restart. Oxford’s oarsmen fared no better: for the third consecutive year Cambridge secured victory in the Men’s Boat Race. As the next chapter of this historic rivalry approaches are Oxford ready to turn the tide?

Counting On Cloud Nine

But for the cool of four-time Olympic champion and Boat Race umpire, Sir Matthew Pinsent, the Women’s Boat Race 2025 could have been as short-lived as it was drama-filled. A calamitous conclusion was avoided when Pinsent allowed the two crews to restart and race the remainder of the course, after a catastrophic clash of blades and boat-stopping crab (when a rower loses control of their oar) 90-seconds in, caused by Oxford’s wayward steering.

“To my mind I was absolutely clearly warning Oxford in the run-up to that,” said Pinsent post-race. “And in that moment when you’ve got two crews at a standstill there was no way they were going to carry on racing.”

“The clash was heavy enough that it was going to stop the race. You could DQ someone straight away — that pops into your mind — but you also can allow, after a restart, to see whether it affected the outcome of the race. Obviously in my opinion it did not affect the outcome of that race.”

Shaken but not deterred, Cambridge rowed away from Oxford, albeit less convincingly than after their first start beneath the crowds on Putney Bridge. A determined effort from Oxford only left them wondering what might have been if not for the clash. By the finish the Light Blues had stretched their lead to two and half lengths. Win number 49, their eighth unanswered.

So the Cambridge juggernaut continues, for now, at least. Any signs of rust? Besides an early season blip in Boston, no, not really. More on that later.

The Cambridge women’s Blue Boat is teeming with talent. Their president alone, Gemma King, has five Boat Race wins to her name. Medical student and two-time winning Blue Carys Early brings yet more Boat Race experience. New recruits Antonia Galland and Camille VanderMeer are rewriting club records with their eye-watering performances on the indoor rowing machine. Galland is something of an eights specialist; she made her senior international debut with the German women’s eight at the 2023 world championships and has minor medals at the under-23 level.

VanderMeer arrived in Cambridge days after her world beating performance in Shanghai, China, where she won world gold with the USA women’s four. The MBA student’s rowing journey started in the basement of her family home, coached by her uncle, Andrew Kallfelz. VanderMeer started out as a sculler before winning gold in the under-23 women’s eight. The American will be a lynchpin in the Light Blue line-up.

More North American muscle comes from Canadian Isobel Campbell, under-23 women’s eights bronze medallist.

This year, German sisters Mia (Cambridge) and Lilli (Oxford) Freischem made headlines when they were selected in opposing crews. The last (and possibly only other) time this happened was in 2004, when Emma (Oxford) and Nicola (Cambridge) Payne faced each other in the Women’s Boat Race. On that occasion, Emma’s Dark Blues recorded a thumping 4-length win in Henley-on-Thames, the venue for the Women’s Boat Race. Is this an omen for 2026?

Oxford’s Ambition

The Dark Blues started their 2026 season with a confidence-boosting bronze medal at the Head Of The Charles Regatta in Boston, Massachusetts, beating Cambridge, in ninth, by over 22 seconds. Many miles later, and despite a wet winter and associated flooding at their home in Wallingford, Oxford’s morale remains high. And for good reason.

The Oxford women’s squad has plenty of Boat Race experience to draw on. Six of the 2025 Blue Boat and half of Osiris are back for another crack at Boat Race glory, including last year’s Women’s President Annie Anezakis, the Australian final year medical student. So too is the former Isis cox, Louis Corrigan, who was Oxford Men’s President in 2024. Like Anezakis, the three-time Oxford Blue and graduate economist Sarah Marshall hopes her fourth and final race along The Championship Course is a Cambridge-beating success.

Oxford boasts Olympians among their ranks. Before making her Boat Race debut, 2026 Women’s President Heidi Long won an Olympic bronze medal in the British women’s eight at the 2024 Paris Games. Esther Briz Zamorano is new to the team. The Spanish Olympian and two-time Beach Sprint champion will sit in the middle of the Oxford Blue Boat, adding power and rhythm. Together with teammates Kyra Delray and Julietta Camahort, these two stars placed third at the Fours Head, a race run over the reverse of the Boat Race course.

Kyra Delray is another Brit with international pedigree. Last year Delray spent the early season recovering from a double hip operation. This time the European A-finalist and world medallist can bring her full force to the Dark Blue camp. American newcomers Emily Molins and Camahort are handy editions to the Oxford squad, both are former under-23 medallists.

Hope then for their head coach, Allan French, who, in his third season in charge, strives for his first Boat Race win and a change of fortune for the Dark Blues. Any complacency though will surely see the Cambridge oarswomen power home to their ninth consecutive victory.

No Pulling Punches in Men’s Race

The recent run of results has skewed Light Blue. Cambridge have won six of the last seven races. Another win and theirs will be the longest Men’s Boat Race winning streak since the ‘90s, albeit a hat trick shy of their seven consecutive victories from 1993 to 1999. That run followed a decade of Dark Blue dominance when Oxford won every race bar one (1986) from 1976 to 1992.

Oxford’s most recent win was in 2022, when their Olympian-laden Blue Boat duffed up Cambridge to the tune of two and half lengths. But that must feel like a lifetime ago for the Dark Blues, since then Oxford have suffered the ignominy of two Cambridge clean sweeps, and an ever-widening gap to close, with the margin of victory growing in each of the subsequent three contests.

The Boat Race 2025 saw the Oxford men on the wrong side of five and half lengths. “It’s close to a humiliation that distance with so many Olympians in that Oxford boat and Cambridge so far ahead,” said the broadcaster and 1984 Olympic champion Martin Cross.

In an attempt to turn the tide Oxford have spent the last few seasons instigating sweeping changes to their coaching roster and organisational structure. Positive change doesn’t happen overnight, but in just his second season in the job, things aren’t looking too bright for the new Oxford Men’s head coach Mark Fangen-Hall.

Cambridge are cooking. For the second year running the Light Blues started their season stateside, winning America’s famous fall regatta, The Head Of The Charles Regatta in Boston, Massachusetts. (The Oxford men did not race.) Fangen-Hall’s counterpart in Cambridge, Rob Baker, has a deep talent pool from which to select his Blue Boat. A third eight entered in the recent Head Of The River race placed 14th overall.

Bolstering returning Blues Noam Mouelle and Simon Hatcher are two incoming internationals, Germany’s Frederik Breuer and Australia’s Alexander McClean. Both are world cup medallists. Breuer last raced for Germany at the Paris Olympics in 2024, finishing fourth in the men’s eights. McClean made his senior international debut at the 2025 world championships in China, and also finished fourth in the men’s eight.

And that’s not to mention the likes of former under-23 world champion Gabriel Obholzer.

The Harvard alumni has a mother who wore Light Blue in the 1991 Women’s Boat Race and a father who wore Dark Blue in the 1991 Men’s Boat Race.

Obholzer junior, the heaviest man in this year’s race, has been breaking records on the indoor rowing machine since he was a teenager and has three under-23 gold medals.

Positives for Oxford

If Oxford do pull off the Hail Mary of Boat Race victories, then a certain up-and-coming Brit will likely lead the charge. Trial Eights winner Harry Geffen is a natural born boat mover who discovered the sport at Eton College. The four-time under-23 world champion made his senior international debut at last year’s world championships in the men’s pair. With eyes on LA 2028, Geffen is working hard to haul himself up the international rowing ranks and will surely be an integral member of Oxford’s Blue Boat.

When it comes to Tideway tactics, Oxford are well served by cox Tobias Bernard. The former Westminster schoolboy learnt to cox on The Championship Course and possesses a keen understanding of this beguiling stretch of water. Twice he has raced Cambridge and twice he has come up short. First, in the Men’s Reserves Race in 2024 and again, last year, in The Boat Race, when he coxed Oxford’s Blue Boat. The chemistry undergraduate will hope to make it third time lucky in 2026. Elected as men’s president, Bernard made a strong start to this campaign by coxing Iceman, his Trial Eights boat, to a seven-length victory.

International pedigree at Oxford comes courtesy of Austria’s lightweight world medallist Julian Schölberl, Australia’s under-23 world medallist Jamie Arnold, and the American sculler James Fetter. Alexander Underwood, the Harvard graduate from Brisbane, will sit in the 7 seat.

A notable lack of Dark Blue Boat Race experience is somewhat offset by ex-Isis rowers Alex Underwood and Felix Crabtree, with Underwood one of the four Oxford Blues in 2026 coming in at 2 metres tall.

For ardent Oxonians and diehard Dark Blue optimists this race has the hallmarks of an epic underdog triumph. Should their crew prevail come Saturday 4 April 2026, it will be the stuff of legend, a truly David and Goliath feat of achievement. Oxford may wish to channel their inner Buster Douglas. A knockout blow from Oxford would certainly live long in the memory.

And finally… what about the bookies?

At the time of writing (Tuesday 31 March), one high street bookmaker has Cambridge favourites to win the Men’s Boat Race at 1/5 (or 83% likely). In the Women’s Boat Race, Oxford are favourites at 1/3 (or 75% likely).