New Club Presidents Announced
The four new Presidents for the upcoming BNY Mellon Boat Race and Newton Women’s Boat Race campaigns have been chosen. Each of the clubs have held internal elections to find their leaders for this landmark 2015 season.
The Oxford University Boat Club have elected Constantine Louloudis as their new President for the 2015 Boat Race. Having enjoyed great success rowing as a junior at Eton College, Constantine also won junior gold and U23 silver at World Championships whilst still a schoolboy. His first Boat Race was the victorious 2011 OUBC crew which he followed up with World U23 Gold alongside Boat Race rival George Nash in the men’s pair. In the summer of 2012 he competed in the London Olympic Games, winning Bronze in the Great Britain men’s eight. Constantine has subsequently won the 2013 and 2014 BNY Mellon Boat Races, and has become a three-tier World Champion, winning the Men’s Eight in Amsterdam at the World Championships this summer. Aged 23, Constantine is in the final year of his Classics degree at Trinity College.
His opposite number is Alexander Leichter, an Austrian, elected by the Cambridge University Boat Club. 24 year-old Alex is a similarly experienced Boat Race triallist, entering his third season with the CUBC. He is the first Austrian President of either Boat Club and the first President to be elected from the preceding years reserve crew since Richard Stokes was President of the CUBC in 2000. The 2000 Boat Race brought to an end a seven-year winning streak for Cambridge. Alex will be hungry for Boat Race success having himself faced defeat in his two races in Goldie, 2013 and 2014. He represented Austria at the World Junior and U23 Championships between 2007 and 2010. Alex is also in his final year, studying Land Economy at St Edmund’s College.
Caroline Reid has been elected Cambridge University Women’s Boat Club President. The 22 year-old British athlete is a three-time blue entering her fourth year with the University and the Boat Club, winning the race in 2012. Caroline attended Framlingham School in Suffolk, where she played tennis, and earned a placed at Jesus College to study Veterinary Medicine, only learning to row once she arrived at Cambridge. She describes herself as ‘fearless, passionate and determined’.
It will be Briton Anastasia Chitty who leads Oxford University Women’s Boat Club to the 2015 Boat Race as President. Anastasia already has two Boat Race wins, in 2013 and 2014, along with two World Championship silvers, one from the Junior women’s coxless four (2011) and another from the U23 women’s eight this summer. In 2013 she won gold at the Youth Olympic Games in Sydney. Aged 20, Anastasia is in her third year of studying medicine at Pembroke College. She began rowing at Canford School, Dorset.
Both Women’s Presidents are British, a trend that has continued since New Zealander Sonia Bracegirdle was Oxford’s President in the 2010 Women’s Boat Race. In contrast, the men’s race has had double British Presidency only once in the past five races. The CUBC this year have elected their second consecutive international President – Alex Leichter is one of five in the last six years.