Rowing comes with a lot of its own language. You’ll pick most of it up within a few outings, but here’s a head start. Can’t find something? Ask anyone at the boathouse, or get in touch.
The boat and the crew
- Eight (VIII): A boat with eight rowers and a cox. Most college racing, including Bumps, is in eights.
- Four (IV): A boat with four rowers, with a cox (IV+) or without (IV−).
- Cox: The person who steers the boat, calls the race plan and keeps the crew safe. Coxes face forwards, rowers face backwards.
- Stroke: The rower sitting nearest the cox (seat 8 in an eight), who sets the rhythm for everyone behind them.
- Bow: The front of the boat, and the rower sitting nearest it (seat 1).
- Bowside and strokeside: The two sides of the boat. Each rower’s blade is on one side or the other.
- Blade: The oar. Also the flat end of it that goes in the water.
- Rigger, gate, slide, footplate: The metal arm that holds the blade, the clip the blade sits in, the track your seat runs on, and where your feet are strapped in.
- Erg: A rowing machine (ergometer). Used for land training and for “erg tests”. Your split is your time per 500 m.
The stroke
- Catch: The moment the blade goes into the water at the start of each stroke.
- Drive: Pushing with your legs, then swinging your body and pulling your arms, to move the boat.
- Finish: The end of the drive, when the blade comes out of the water.
- Recovery: Sliding back up to the catch for the next stroke.
- Feathering and squaring: Turning the blade flat during the recovery (feathered) and upright before the catch (squared).
- Rate: Strokes per minute. Races are rowed at a higher rate than steady training.
- Crab: When a blade gets stuck in the water and can’t be taken out in time. An ejector crab is one strong enough to throw the rower out of the boat.
Calls you’ll hear
- Easy (there): Stop rowing.
- Hold it up: Stop the boat quickly by putting the blades in the water square. Used in emergencies.
- Back it down: Row backwards.
- Spin: Turn the boat round.
- Number off from bow: Each rower calls their seat number when ready.
- Hands on, and lift: Commands for carrying the boat in and out of the boathouse.
Racing in Cambridge
- Bumps: Cambridge’s famous four-day races in Lent Term (Lents) and Easter Term (Mays). Crews chase each other down the Cam and try to catch the boat ahead.
- Getting-on Race: A time trial before Bumps for crews competing for the last places in the bottom division.
- Blades: Bumping every day of Bumps. The crew can buy an oar painted with their names and results.
- Spoons: Being bumped every day. The opposite of blades.
- Row-over: Neither bumping nor being bumped on a day.
- Headship: Finishing top of the first division: Head of the River.
- O1, W1, O2…: Crews are named by side and order: O1 is the first open boat, W2 the second women’s boat, and so on.
- Fairbairns: The Fairbairn Cup, a long-distance time trial at the end of Michaelmas, run by Jesus College Boat Club. For many novices it’s their first big race.
- Queens’ Ergs and Emma Sprints: Two of the first races for novices in Michaelmas: an indoor erg competition and short side-by-side races.
- Head race: A time trial where crews start one after another, rather than side by side.
- Novices and seniors: Novices are in their first term of rowing (Michaelmas). From Lent onwards everyone rows as a senior.
- Bank party: Supporters and coaches who follow a crew along the towpath, usually on bikes.
- Blue: Representing Cambridge against Oxford, for example in the Boat Race.
River life
- Flag: Set by CUCBC to say which crews may go out, depending on the river conditions. See River flag & lighting times.
- Lighting down and lighting up: When it becomes light enough to row in the morning, and too dark in the evening.
- Outing: A training session on the water.
Off the water
- BCD: The Boat Club Dinner, held at the end of every term.
- Swaps: A dinner shared with another college’s club or society.
- Crew curry: A traditional crew meal, especially after Bumps.
- Fines: Light-hearted forfeits handed out at socials for rowing mishaps.