With little more than two months to go to the 153rd Boat Race, the third and last to be sponsored by Xchanging, the Cambridge training regime is in full swing and final crew selection is rapidly approaching.

Six days every week in the gym at Goldie Boathouse by the River Cam and on the River Ouse at Ely, the Cambridge squad is focussing on fitness, power and technique.

Chief Coach Duncan Holland is pleased with progress: “The build-up has been unspectacular but solid, which is just how it should be.”

Unspectacular from the Coach's point of view perhaps, but highlights along the way have included a Cambridge Coxed Four, with two reigning world champions, winning the Fours Head on the Tideway course in November, beating into second place a Leander crew with three reigning world champions on board. More recently Cambridge took the top five BUSA places at the British Indoor Rowing Championships held in the Birmingham Arena.

Today sees the second ‘maximal' ergometer test of the academic year when each squad member will complete a gruelling timed 5km on a rowing machine. As well as being a significant part of the selection process, these tests double as entry to the Great Britain Rowing Trials.

Squad members will be joined for the tests by 18-year-old Charles Cousins, a member of the Great Britain World Class Start Programme. A local boy from Long Road Sixth Form College who is a member of Rob Roy Boat Club in Cambridge, Charles was at the World Juniors last year. He is now a hot contender for the national squad. His coach Adrian Cassidy, a former Blues Development Coach, asked if he could join the University athletes for the day.

Cambridge are widely predicted to be favourites for the Boat Race, with a squad that includes five who rowed at last year's World Championships against Oxford's one, but the Coach is not complacent: “One thing Oxford University Boat Club do very well is to produce their best form on the day, so we must be wary. Nothing but our best will be good enough.”

Meanwhile the Light Blue rowers have been keeping up old links by taking tea with the Bishop of Ely last week. Charles Merivale (St John's College) rowed in the very first Boat Race in 1829 and went on to become Dean of Ely Cathedral.

The Boat Race on the River Thames from Putney to Mortlake is on Easter Saturday, 7 April, starting at 4.30pm.

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