BOATING GOSSIP.

Globe, Volume I, Issue 19, 22 June 1874, Page 3

BOATING GOSSIP.

It is, I believe, the part of a boating correspondent to review ihe events of each past season. I am not sure that on the present occasion there is over much to talk about , in fact in casting back, looking over past files of the papers, and drawing on a pretty fair memory, I cannot look forward lo make much “ copy ” out of the rowing season just closed. A traveller writing upon a lucky country has a chapter on snakes. Chapter 59 —“On Snakes." “There arc none.” It appears to me that my resume of the recent boating year will very much resemble in its brevity that terse but truthful chapter. Boating, or to be more particular, rowing, has fallen off. We have still as good boats as can bo turned out, as any one inspecting our rolling, stock can testify, we have a public willing to support aquatics, but we do not seem to have many men either able or willing to go in for anything more trying than a Saturday’s afternoon pull down to New Brighton and back. This is no doubt a pleasant and healthy recreation enough, but if it is to be the maximum attained by a province which rather fancies itself in boating, the sooner that province knocks off giving orders to Mr Salter lor racing boats the better. It is of course impossible to say what next season may bring forth, but at present 1 should say good, roomy Sydney skiffs, with masts and sails, are about our form. The inter-provincial, which was the only rowing regatta of the season, was well carried out, and, thanks to the exertions of several members of the central club, and notably Mr Thomson, the hon sec, the necessary funds were forthcoming, and, to use a very hackneyed expression, the affair passed off very well ; but the regatta was a very convincing proof of the truth of my statement above that Canterbury has fallen off in rowing. Lyttelton, for some inscrutable reason, has now no boating club, and was not represented at all. Kaiapoi had all its work to rise a four, and Christchurch and Heathcote had to amalgamate. That a Canterbury or even a Christchurch crew could have been selected which would have given the province a good run for their money I have not the slightest doubt ; but the best men were divided, and on the principle of never crying over spilt milk, I have only to repeat our former congratulations lo the West Coast crew on a victory which their pluck so well deserved, reserving to myself the right of reverting again to the subject of representative crews. The Interprovincial Four-oar was so minutely described at the time that a rechauffe of that contest is scarcely required in the present paper. I may however, perhaps, be permitted lo make a passing remark on the wonderful condition of the Woodstock crew. Of their style, perhaps, the less said the better, but the result of the race showed that four men, accustomed to row together, having confidence in each other, and in right good trim will, in any colonial regatta, take a deal of beating. While on the subject of the big race, it appears to me that at present the steering without coxswains is rather a mistake. It may be admitted that a coxswain is a weight which a four-oared crew is belter without, always supposing that some member of the crow is sufficiently skilled to do the piloting and his own work too ; but our experience, “ so far as we have got,” tends rather to show that we have been in too much of a hurry to dispense with our pilots. In a lot. of say five boats, we may assume, for the sake of argument, that there arc two crews possessing men capable of rowing and steering too. Ihe chances of both these crews may, and from past experience, we may say probably will be, spoilt by the wild steering of some or all the other three. I may be wrong, but it seems to me that we can learn from the last interprovincial four-oar, that we had better be quite sure of our rowing before we attempt to combine steering with it. The Pair-o. r Champion Race brought out a good number of competitors, but of the rowing it is impossible to say too hard things. The winners had practised together steadily, and won easily, but the rest were almost to a man members of the crews which had competed in the big race. Most of them had never had more than a few days’ practice together in a pair-oar, and, as usual, took it for granted that the fact of rowing for a month with a man in a four gave them an excellent chance of winning with him in a pair, without any extra practice. 1 his is erroneous. No class of rowing is harder to learn properly than pair-oar, and in forming crews no rowing is more useful. This remark is not original. It is the experience of the best oarsmen in England, and I make captains of clubs a present of this imported remark with the greatest pleasure. Dawson was of course our only representative in the Sculling Race, and it will be, I think, a long while before we get one anything like as good. His performance, from what reason I know not. was anything but first class. Dawson is a finished sculler, and a powerful one to boot; but Hearn cut him down from the start in a style that induces the belief that he mi'dit travel profitably on his sculling abilities. This is, however, only a memory of the past, to come back to the present, supposing Dawson cither to leave Canterbury or to give up rowing, we have not a sculler to represent the province ; and assuming that Dawson’s boat goes the way of most boats of its class, we have not a boat in Christchurch at any rale fit to put a sculler into. In a province which usually in its annual regattas has several sculling races, it does seem strange that no sculling boats of any kind have been procured by any of the clubs. Sculling has been called by one of the best boating men in England the “ poetry of rowing.” We don’t seem to go in for poetry hero ; but we might perhaps do so in the future, on the principle that if it bo found impossible to persuade four men, or even two, to go in together for regular practice, perhaps in each, or even one club, there may be found one man who could be induced to go and row by himself. At present this is impossible. The United Boating Club has done, very good work since it started, and in the fo thcoming season will probably do better still. One subject I beg to offer for their especial consideration is the matter of bumping races. To say that these races would be very popular with the public would induce men to go in for rowing who otherwise would never row at all, and would prove a great assistance to captains of clubs in forming racing crows, is only to repeat what I have

said before ; but as I pointed out long ago. it is a very difficult race to bring oil successfully, owing to the great difference in speed of our various boats. The only attempt made as yet thoroughly proved this. Boats like the Isis cannot compete successfully against those of the Sabrina and Tamesis class, and this is the more to bo kept in mind when it is quite on the cards that the crew told off for the Isis may be an inferior crew to those rowing in superior boats. The subject of representative crew's I’m coming on to again in a future communication. This is already long enough for a time when boating is not going on, but before bringing this paper to a close I want to quote a remark of Mr Baker’s at the interprovincial regatta dinner. Mr Baker, who it is needless to cay rowed three seasons in his University boat, and may therefore, perhaps, be considered a fair authority even here, complained —amongst other things —ihat “ in Cauterbuiy men got in'o an outrigger long before they were fit even to go into a tub.” This is severe, but true. I can only reply in our defence, that Mr Baker had, when he spoke as above, scarcely been here long enough to grasp the fact that there arc very few boating men here willing to go into a boat of any kind, and that such being the case, captains of clubs are compelled from force of circumstances to do the best they can. I hope this statement will prove satisfactory to all concerned, but boating, to be successful next season, wants re-organising to a consideiable extent Sampan.