Some of you are probably getting the impression that all I’m doing over here in Cambridge is rowing. I assure you that this is (mostly) an illusion. I really do academic things too, but I thought that most of you would find my rowing stories more interesting than my maths. I’m now done with lectures for the term and am starting to review and starting to look at papers for an essay that I will be writing next term. I will either be writing about Lagrangians of hypergraphs with Imre Leader, or on hereditary properties of graphs/hypergraphs with Bela Bollobas.
For everyone back home who doesn’t know already, I will be returning to Fort Collins on December 10th and staying until January 10th. I hope to see all of you while I’m there (and do a lot of skiing).
Ok, now on to more rowing. Today was the first day of the Fairbairn Cup, the biggest race of Michaelmas (Fall) term. The morning got off to a good start at 6AM when I discovered that the sandwich I bought for breakfast had been nicked out of the kitchen. The weather was, with the exception of the hail storm, the worst I’ve seen since arriving in Cambridge. Freezing temperatures, 20 MPH winds, and sleet. We were wearing no gloves (hinders blade control) and minimal clothes (hinders movement), and had to row 2.8 km into a head/cross wind. Then we had to wait at the other end for about 1.5 hours while everyone else did the same thing before we could row home.
The race itself (aside from the frozen, blistered hands and the whole body screaming with every stroke) was fantastic. Our crew came together better than we ever have before. Our stroke man had been having serious issues with rhythm and stroke length that were throwing off the whole boat, but he pulled it together magnificently for that race. We all stayed together, didn’t crab, and gave it everything we had. It hurt like hell, but it was everything we had been working towards for the last 2 months, and it made it all worthwhile. We finished 19th, which was not what we hoped for, but thats fine. Back at the boathouse 2 of our rowers threw each other in the Cam.
Oh, and we’re double entered in the senior race as well, so tomorrow we do it again. Except its twice as long. The weather should be better, however, and I don’t have to wake up quite as early.
Now I’m off to enjoy the merriment and free alcohol of the BA (graduate student) Christmas dinner/party.
Visited cambridge some years ago and did drunken canon balls off the bridge over the river. Idea was to upset the punters and generally make a scene. I guess I would have been branded as a “hooligan”? Cant imagine what posessed me to do that other than my collegues and lots and lots of beer.
Comment by rockwatching — 6 December 2008 @ 21:32