Summaries and Customer Reviews are supplied by Amazon.com

Average Customer Rating:

good but not great

Customer Rating:

de Rond's book is initially compelling and I had to finish it the day I started. Despite this, it was ultimately unsatisfying. In some key areas, he focussed too much on his own role in settling disputes, or doing a social row at the Head of the Charles. While I have no issue with his own activities, I bought the book to read about the Cambridge oarsmen, not about his own conflict resolution skills. To be fair, he went into good detail on the baby-mutiny over initial selection. But in my opinion, he failed to go into enough detail on the extremely unusual case of replacing a blade AFTER selection, especially as to how the rest of the crew or the replaced man dealt with the decision. Likewise, Dowbiggin's installation was somewhat skirted over. A good read, no doubt, but given the access he had, it could have been so much more. I doubt I will read it again but equally I won't give it away (just).

Review by Allan Fowlie

Customer Rating:

This book provides a fantastic insight into the emotion and psychology of competitive team sports. Even though the result of the race is known, Mark du Rond's wonderful pacing of the story ensured that I STILL got nervous as the Boat Race date loomed ever closer. I found myself worrying that the team has not resolved several key issues until late in the day and was fascinated at how they were resolved as the fog of the selection process cleared and the crew gradually emerged and took control of their own destiny. Much to my wife's (mild) displeasure (she bought the book for me) I could not put it down until the whole story had been told. One of the things that emerges from the story is to remind us that competition is not JUST about winning, it is about the journey we take toward our goals, what we learn about ourselves along the way and what we carry forward forever with us whatever the result. Despite being originally an "Oxford man", over the course of the months of training Mark earns, for the reader, a seat at the selection meetings and the elite dinners and places us within earshot of the private conversations with the team where we learn of their hopes and fears and individual struggles. I think this book is a big achievement and I HIGHLY recommend it.

Interesting Insights into a unique sporting event

Customer Rating:

Mark de Rond's book is a fascinating look into the often mis-understood world of Cambridge rowing. Written in a diary format from when the crew hopefuls assemble in September through the various selection tests to the formation of the crews and the actual boat race in April. His book contains many insights into rowing training in general but also the unique set-up of the Cambridge University Boat Club. He looks at the personalities, the intra-crew tensions, the traditions and the tough selection decisions. The only criticism I have is that De Rond, especially in the early chapters, seemed intent in making himself part of the story. With a preface that pointlessly agonizes about his role as anthropologist and whether or not he can be objective and later chapters that talk about his own experience of rowing the head of the charles I would have preferred if he'd told the story more from the perspective of pure observer.

Fascinating insights as relevant to team building as to rowing

Customer Rating:

This is a fascinating inside look at the preparation by the 2007 winning Cambridge Boat Race crew by a sociologist who more or less lived with the squad throughout the period and who appears to have played a crucial role at some moments - for instance in helping sort out some disputes within one of the crews. It comes close to Daniel Topolski's 'Boat Race', the story of the Oxford revival from 1973 to 1984 and for me one of the best books on rowing ever written. It is miles ahead of Topolski's account of the 1987 mutiny - for me far over rated. I was once captain of the rowing club (Jesus College) right next to the Goldie Boathouse (the CUBC headquarters) and have known some Boat Race oarsmen quite well - e.g rowed in races with them. And yet it is a very closed world, not open to the uninitiated. I had no idea what went on in there and this book really does open the doors. I found it extremely interesting. Some fasinating insights included the detailed description by an (anonymous) squad member of how legally to raise testosterone levels before a race (the lengths these men would go to!). And then quick advice on how best to lower them again. The selection battles for the crew are well described and left me with the uneasy feeling that there might well have been people who had good grounds for feeling unhappy about not being in the crew. The account of the replacement of Russ Glenn as cox just before the race is very sympathetic but, by contrast, leaves one in little doubt that the decision was hard but fair. I was left with a great deal of sympathy - even liking - for the crew and for the Head Coach Duncan Holland, who left his position as Head Coach when his contract was not renewed after losing the Boat Race in 2008. And yet it was hard to avoid the conclusion that the crew, while winning, had significantly underperformed. A couple of minor black spots: The book frustratingly does not examine the controversy over strokeman Thorsten Engelmann, the heavist man in Boat Race history at over 110 kg. He is the only person to have a Blue withdrawn when he left the University without completing his degree - but he comes across as a very sympathetic figure. The photos are a disappointment - almost none of the crew as a crew, or of the race itself. Given that some of the people who play a key part in the story did not make the crew, it was a shame that none of them (other than Glenn) feature in the pictures. I would also have liked the statistics - the crew lists (both races) and times etc at the end. I have worked in the organisational development field over recent years and the story is as relevant to team building as much as it is to rowing aficionados. I do recommend it.