The 'Boat Race' Spoiler.

Aggieboy

Ooooooooooooh, swimming protester stops race! The excitement!!!!

McBain_v1

Another ruddy commuter protesting about the "Girls in..." threads no doubt!

Cleat Eastwood

floating voters protesting again.

pinno

He has probably run out of Eccles cakes, poor bloke

Aggieboy

Wouldn't mind a stroke of the Oxford cox (checks spelling).

Aggieboy

More excitement!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Fastlad

bet he feels a complete plum rowing without a oar Definitely up shit creek without a paddle

McBain_v1

What was the cox doing? How can steering your boat into the competitor possibly help? I bet that cox is going to get dumped faster than a dodgy vindaloo from the team!

Schobiedoo

It's really not been a good day for Oxford! Now a rower collapsed!

McBain_v1

Hope that rower is okay - bet he was pulling hard because of the extra bloke they were lugging. I think that the Oxford cox had better "be nice" to the entire rowing crew after that display of dodging driving.

rick_chasey

Bloke'll be fine.

rick_chasey

http://elitismleadstotyranny.squarespace.com/

The protester's blog.

alihisgreat

Rick Chasey wrote:

http://elitismleadstotyranny.squarespace.com/

The protester's blog.

What a pathetic excuse for a human being. Probably just bitter that the mean tutors at Oxford/Cambridge said he wasn't good enough and rejected him.. so he's turned his 'academic' abilities to writing rambling and poorly constructed blog posts about evil rich people.

Maybe instead of targeting the rich and their 'social' activities he should focus on petitioning the government to improve state education.. that would do a lot more for 'equality' and eliminating 'elitism' than swimming out into the Thames, almost getting your head cut off, spending a night in a Police Station and writing a blog post encouraging protests to disrupt the economy that simply screams TL;DR.



Also that was the worst boat race I've ever seen.. as an Oxford supporter I'm gutted that the swimmer ruined it when Oxford were pulling ahead and looking like they were on for the win.. and then the clash or oars was the cherry on top of the cake.

rick_chasey

ALIHISGREAT wrote:

Also that was the worst boat race I've ever seen.. as an Oxford supporter I'm gutted that the swimmer ruined it when Oxford were pulling ahead and looking like they were on for the win.. and then the clash or oars was the cherry on top of the cake.

I was brought up in Cambridge, I've coxed on the Cam (for city crews, not uni..) for 6 or so years, and my mother works at the university, so it's clear where my loyalties lie.

Oxford cox was sailing close to the wind for a lot of it. Wasn't entirely unpredictable.

I initially thought that the blade that broke off might have been weakened by the swimmer.

alihisgreat

Rick Chasey wrote:

ALIHISGREAT wrote:

Also that was the worst boat race I've ever seen.. as an Oxford supporter I'm gutted that the swimmer ruined it when Oxford were pulling ahead and looking like they were on for the win.. and then the clash or oars was the cherry on top of the cake.

I was brought up in Cambridge, I've coxed on the Cam (for city crews, not uni..) for 6 or so years, and my mother works at the university, so it's clear where my loyalties lie.

Oxford cox was sailing close to the wind for a lot of it. Wasn't entirely unpredictable.

I initially thought that the blade that broke off might have been weakened by the swimmer.

Yeah I don't really know where the blame lies for the oar breakage, going to have to take your word for it that the Oxford cox was being too aggressive... but the swimmer had already ruined the race.

The umpire had raced for Cambridge for 3 years in the 80s though... so i think its pretty clear where his loyalties lie

straas

Continuing to chase with a lost blade was futile at best, and likely contributed to the collapse.

In case anyone didn't click on the protesters link, here's what he suggests you do;

· Setting off Fire Alarms in buildings where we work, perhaps at strategic times, when a particular meeting is meant to happen that will agree the cutting of services, for example? (This action seems morally okay as all the emergency services happily deployed vast numbers to participate in the filming of a Bond movie the other weekend on Whitehall).


· If you work in a private company or government department that is helping enclose Our Public perhaps you could work slowly, make mistakes, loose documents, sending large documents to clog up email accounts?


· If you are a taxi driver can you take the passenger the slowest possible and most expensive route?


· If you are a plumber can you ‘store up’ a problem in the office of a conservative think tank office you have been called to?


· If you have a tow truck company can you park in front of Nick Clegg or David Cameron’s driveway, accidentaly? Could you tow their car away?


· If you ride a bike and it’s difficult to find somewhere to lock your bike (as bike racks are taken away), can you lock it the one of the corporate bikes which now litter our streets everywhere?


· If you clean the bathroom of someone that considers themselves elite or is an elite sympathiser, like a right wing professor, can you never put loo paper in their bathroom?


· If you work in a restaurant where elitists eat, can you serve the food once it is cold or cook the wrong food?


· If you are a builder repairing the house of an elitist can you also bug it and share the footage and audio online?


· If you are a pest controller and you are called to the office or home of an elitist or elitist sympathiser can you fail at destroying the pest and possibly introduce new pests?


· Can you take up the time of a ‘VIP’ you work for by arranging time consuming meetings, asking as many questions as possible? Can you make them late?


· If you work in a call centre, can you refund people and find the best discounts?


· If you are a student and attend a talk, can you challenge the professors? Can you take the stage and highlight to the audience the work they have done in contrast to academia?


· Are there networking events designed for the elites and their sympathisers where you could let off a stink bomb?


· If you work in audio-visuals for meetings/conferences could you put up the wrong slides, or turn the correct ones upside down and remove cables, rendering the equipment unusable?


· Could you plan your own government or council made up from people you admire and trust – in similar vain to Football Manager and publish it on the internet?


· Are there events like today’s boat race that you could do something similar to Emily Davison with? Is this possible in the lead up to and within the Olympics itself?


This is a special call to security guards. The elite depend on you the most. Without you they are nothing.

rick_chasey

straas wrote:

Continuing to chase with a lost blade was futile at best, and likely contributed to the collapse.

Why?

rozzer32

I think it's stupid that the umpire was an ex Cambridge boat club president, not exactly a fair race is it.

Roy Keane is going to be ref at the next Manchester derby.

rick_chasey

rozzer32 wrote:

I think it's stupid that the umpire was an ex Cambridge boat club president, not exactly a fair race is it.

Roy Keane is going to be ref at the next Manchester derby.

They rotate between the universities every year.

It's a university thing. They like to keep it between them.

rozzer32

Rick Chasey wrote:

rozzer32 wrote:

I think it's stupid that the umpire was an ex Cambridge boat club president, not exactly a fair race is it.

Roy Keane is going to be ref at the next Manchester derby.

They rotate between the universities every year.

It's a university thing. They like to keep it between them.

Ahhhh you learn something new every day.

Still think it would make more sense to have a neutral umpire. Rick can you explain this first 100m rule or something that they were going on about?

capt_slog

It would be nice if some different teams got to the final.

alihisgreat

Rick Chasey wrote:

straas wrote:

Continuing to chase with a lost blade was futile at best, and likely contributed to the collapse.

Why?

Its like cycling a tandem with a partner whose pedals aren't connected to the drive-train.

In the case of rowing they've lost 1/8th of their power and are carrying dead weight.

Fastlad

bloody waste of time continuing with a broken oar. Not to mention it nearly killed a guy in the bow. They should have refused to row.

straas

As above really, you've lost around 13% of your power for the same weight.

Oxford couldn't have done a thing after the break.

lycraholic

ALIHISGREAT wrote:

Its like cycling a tandem with a partner whose pedals aren't connected to the drive-train.

In the case of rowing they've lost 1/8th of their power and are carrying dead weight.

It's funny how much of a difference losing rowers can make. I was racing a mixed boat (4 girls, 4 boys) at Cambridge a while back; in the middle of a 500m piece, two girls simultaneously came off their seats (don't ask). In terms of weight and output these girls were probably equivalent to one of the male rowers, but even momentarily losing them made it go from 'yes this is normal' to 'AAAAAAAAAAAAA COLOSSAL PAIN'.

It's also very difficult to maintain the boat's rhythm with rowers out. Huge effort goes on keeping the boat 'sat'- that is, level and without any oars dragging in the water. If each rower is going forward and backward simultaneously, this is fairly simple; but if any rowers aren't rowing it becomes totally impossible.

/boatiechat

McBain_v1

Seems to me that the protester is a total ar$ewipe! I don't think that the Boat Race 2012 will be remembered for any of the right reasons, but at least it will be remembered for much longer than most of them. I hear that the rowing chappie who was done in earlier is now recovering in hospital.

cyco2

I thought I heard the Oxford cox protesting later to the umpire that she had followed the correct path while being asked by the umpire to alter course. That's like following your satnav up a one way street. What a complete plonker :roll:

McBain_v1

Oxford cox had to say something to cover up a monumental balls-up. I hope that she gets over it quickly. No doubt daddy can buy her a new pony and she'll be okay

symo

Did a load of posh over-privileged rich kids with a sense of entitlement win?

Had to laugh when I overheard some of the commentary "These men really know how to suffer"; I mean really? Don't see them doing 260km and pave too do you.

Why on earth is this on TV, does it relate to a load of ex-public schoolboys from Oxford and Cambridge running the BBC since it's inception?

lycraholic

symo wrote:

Did a load of posh over-privileged rich kids with a sense of entitlement win?

Had to laugh when I overheard some of the commentary "These men really know how to suffer"; I mean really? Don't see them doing 260km and pave too do you.

Why on earth is this on TV, does it relate to a load of ex-public schoolboys from Oxford and Cambridge running the BBC since it's inception?

Here's a challenge. You do 15k on a rowing machine, all at the pace these lads put out (1:40/500m at a guess), and tell me how you feel afterwards.

I'm a rower and a cyclist, and I can tell you that rowing is a really special kind of suffering, even beyond time trialling, pave, you name it. Think about it: on a bike you have all the sensory feedback of the bike, the feeling that you're going somewhere, loads of stuff to distract you from the pain. In a boat, you have nothing else but the guy in front's head to concentrate on. You sink into your skull and the pain is the only thing you can feel.

(but then I come from a state school, what would I know :P )

Gizmodo

McBain_v1 wrote:

Oxford cox had to say something to cover up a monumental balls-up. I hope that she gets over it quickly. No doubt daddy can buy her a new pony and she'll be okay

^

I must admit I don't get the fascination with the boat race, just why is it on telly every year? If Manchester and Salford (or Birmingham and Aston) universities held an annual football match or cycling race would the BBC be crawling all over it? I presume it's just a history thing.