The Sport of Scholars Has Come Out of Its Shell : UCLA, Cal Crew Teams Set to Row Against Oxford

The Boat Race. Oxford versus Cambridge. Close to two tons of young manpower rowing a pair of featherweight shells along four miles of London’s River Thames from Putney Steps to the Watney brewery at Mortlake.

The annual Boat Race is a 157-year-old bit of Britain and a public tradition honored by a title that’s clearly more declarative than generic. The Boat Race. That puts it alongside other cardinal picnics for British sports. The Cup Final. The Test Matches. Wimbledon.

The Boat Race also is families divided for a day by 50-pence bets, a television audience of 12 million, and the grubbiest schoolboy’s instant allegiance to Oxford or Cambridge universities.

Loaded With Tradition

It has been roast beef and ale picnics on brewery barges, riverfront buildings dressed like arriving battleships and ears glued to the BBC commentaries of John Snagg: “They’re coming under Barnes Bridge now . . . in, out, one, two . . . it’s still Cambridge by a canvas. . . .”

Now half of that spectacle, at least one of its eights and a full portion of splendid history is coming to Southern California.

On Saturday, Oxford will row against UCLA and UC Berkeley. UCLA claims to own the most powerful collegiate athletic program in the world. Cal, holder of Olympic gold medals by the dozen, is a dreadnought of an American crew.

Then again, there’s Oxford.

It is Britain’s oldest university that in 1829 helped launch crew as the world’s oldest intercollegiate sport. Cambridge might lead their annual series 68-62 (less the interruptions of two World Wars and one dead heat) but Oxford is on a 10-year winning streak.

While American colleges (with the exception of Harvard and Yale) settle for 2,000-meter sprints, the backs and thighs of Oxford and Cambridge blues (dark blue for Oxford, light blue for Cambridge) are toughened for courses of four miles, one furlong and 180 yards. And they row that distance faster than Steve Scott can run it.

“Oxford is the epitome of crew,” said David Stubbs, 20, of Atherton. He’s an English major in his second year as a starboard oar for UCLA. “When I think of crew I think of the oldest collegiate race in the world and I think of Oxford and Cambridge.”

Stubbs says he also thinks about being intimidated by Saturday’s contest. So does Mark Klein, 20, captain of UCLA crew.

“I am a little overwhelmed by the whole idea,” Klein acknowledged. Hence his slight fatalism. “At this point, all we can do is look after ourselves and go to the line in the best shape possible.”

UCLA will bring a new boat to this high-noon shoot-out on Ballona Creek (now there’s a name to boggle Oxford’s old school record books) near the UCLA boathouse at Marina del Rey. It’s a 220-pound, carbon-fiber shell purchased from the New Zealand team that won a bronze medal at the 1984 Olympics.

Oxford will be using a sister shell, a loaner from a San Francisco sportsman.

Cal will stay with a friend and a good-luck piece, an older wood boat.

Benedict Arnolds?

Its crew, however, will be without the muscular services of former standout oars Chris Clark and George Livingstone. They have graduated and departed Berkeley. Unfortunately, Clark and Livingstone departed for further education, became Yanks at Oxford and will be returning to row against their alma mater.

Benedict Arnolds in dark blue? “I think it’s great,” said Mike Bennett, chairman of the event. He’s a former Cal oarsman. “It will bring a lot of passion into the Cal boat, a fire not just to beat Oxford but to kick the butts of their old boys.”

Crew is a collegiate oddball. Participation is small, like fencing. Revenues are nil, like badminton. It is not an NCAA sport, like lacrosse. Unlike baseball and football, crew is neither started in high school nor continued professionally after college. There are no scholarships and at UCLA and Cal, the entrance standard for crew is a 3.4 grade point average.

It is indeed a peculiar sport, agrees actor Gregory Peck, and one that attracts some interesting students. Such as Cal freshman and English major Eldred Gregory Peck. He was stroke oar for Cal’s junior varsity crew, 1937-38, and is honorary chairman of the Oxford-UCLA-Cal race.

“It stays with you,” he said. “And all the things they say about crew are quite true. You do put out every day, every afternoon and with everything you’ve got. You just can’t waltz through. We used to row every day from September to December on Oakland Estuary, break for Christmas, then return to row until June.”

“But that was the fun of it.”

There also were bawdy sing-songs; his three-steak dinners paid for by washing dishes at a sorority; bunkies and teammates who were gentlemen before jocks and brains studying the classics, medicine and engineering . . . and always there was the seduction of crew, a pure sport, one that Peck hesitates to discuss.

Not that he’s tired of talking about it. But people just don’t seem to share the subtleties, he said. Nor understand the spiritualism and aesthetics of it all.

“Most people see only eight men throwing their backs into it,” he explained. “But that’s not it.” He patted both thighs. “You’re applying these. It’s stamina, strength, teamwork and synchronization.”

Seeking Perfect Rhythm

He drew his hands smoothly across a table. “You’re making the boat move smoothly without any checks . . . because there are eight men moving perfectly with the boat, because there are eight oars being applied to the water at exactly the same time.

“And when we’d got that going, that perfect rhythm, we’d know it and we’d start to yell. ‘We’ve got it. . . . Hang on to it. . . . Keep it going!’

“By that time,” grinned Peck, “their (listeners’) eyes are glazed over and so I stop talking.”

There are devotees who believe that crew builds tenacity and application for a lifetime. Peck is inclined to agree: “You do learn that the key to success is that you go all out. You can’t hide. If you dog it you’re dropped from the squad or you’re rowing in the seventh or eighth boat.

“And that applies to acting, to the theater, to any job you want to do well. You’ve got to put all your resources into it, all your physical and mental resources.”

British actor-comedian-pianist-composer-conductor-organist Dudley Moore is a traditionalist with a sense of quality and national substance. All year there’s a tape of Christmas carols sung by the choir of Caius (pronounced Keys) College, Cambridge, on the cassette player in his BMW. He misses Cox orange pippins and the English countryside. “I get very moved by the patriotic music of Elgar. If I see a Coronation mug I get all weepy. It’s just something that’s there.”

So is his sentiment for the Boat Race: “I used to listen to it (the Boat Race) on radio as a kid and was always part of the excitement. . . . It was a drag if Oxford sank or were out of it after three strokes because someone got bashed in the eye with an oar.”

Then came degrees in music from Oxford and an invitation for young Moore (then weighing 126 pounds with his pockets filled with half-crowns) to become coxswain for a Magdalen (pronounced Mawd-lin) College eight. He declined: “I just thought it would be very boring to be a cox, watching everybody else doing the rowing . . . and especially to have eight big blokes wanting to throw you in the water.”

Makes Light of Loyalties

Now Moore is master of ceremonies for this boat race: “I’m probably the least qualified person . . . except for being one of the few persons in Los Angeles who have been to one of those nefarious institutions, Oxford and Cambridge.”

He’s quick to make light of his loyalties: “The only reason I began supporting Oxford as a kid was because I thought dark blue a delightful color,” he told a recent race press conference. “I used to shout rather mindlessly for Oxford and I remain close to the water . . . every time I shave. There’s a certain feeling as you go around the chin the second time, swirling the water with your razor, seeing the foam.”

Later, over a typically British shepherd’s pie in the quite authentic King’s Head pub (which will cater the VIP enclosure at the Oxford-California joust) in Santa Monica, Moore acknowledged some old and serious memories stirred by the event.

Rented a Skiff

He did indeed row as a youngster. After violin lessons there was a dip in a public swimming pool and then a one-hour rental of a skiff in a neighborhood (Dagenham, Essex) park.

“I used to love that the seat was on wheels and that I could feather (skim) the oars over the water,” he said. “I got rather good at it.”

He would have been honored to be a member of his college eight and maybe an Oxford Blue. But as an oarsman, a participant, not as a coxswain and virtual spectator.

Now comes Oxford to his adopted California.

“At first I thought it was just a lovely idea,” he said. “Then, suddenly, I got that gang warfare feeling for Oxford again. It (the race) is not exactly too meaningful. But it’s fun, it’s thrilling . . . and maybe that’s the meaning.”

Nobody is making book on the boat race. One person involved with the event has threatened to stir up odds and action with a call to Jimmy the Greek and Las Vegas. But bet on a boat race? Why not? When Oxford races in England the crew is sponsored by Ladbroke’s, one of Britain’s largest bookmakers.

Of course, with 6,000 miles between comparisons, it’s going to be difficult to assess form for this Anglo-American challenge. Can Oxford, an inveterate four-miler, gear down for a 2000-meter event? Are they long on history and romance but short on toughness? Is Cal’s day done? Is it time for UCLA’s combination of the visceral, cerebral and physical (“Beat Oxford,” advises a chalkboard in the UCLA boat house, “It Comes From Within”) to triumph? What of UCLA’s high-tech boat and Cal’s wooden-waller?

Mayor Tom Bradley, a UCLA alum, hasn’t wagered but he has announced presentation of a trophy oar to the winning team.

“With my best wishes,” Bradley said. “And my best wish is that it goes to UCLA.”

Peck swerved from playing prophet, acknowledged the traditions of Oxford and the hunger of UCLA but said: “When it comes to Olympic championships, Cal, Navy and Washington have dominated the past 40 years of eight-oared shells.”

Moore voted with his heart.

“I’m not going to say may the best man win. I want Oxford to win. Of course, if Oxford wins I might never get work in this town again.”