Rowing at New College offers options for all commitment levels. It’s perfectly possible to show up unfailingly at crewdates, make a fool of yourself and then become curiously unavailable for 6am outings for most of the term. It’s also possible to love NCBC and all things rowing so much that you come to Oxford a week early to enjoy the pleasures of a training camp. This year, the latter variety of member vastly outnumbered the former, with dozens of returning for the delights of a week of rowing on the Thames, purple and gold burning in their hearts.

The weather tried but did not manage to extinguish those flames. Although our camp was blighted by heavy rain a few days prior and a consequent red flag on the Isis, we didn’t let that stop the extravaganza of training, freezing temperatures, and questionable chat. NCBC went on a couple of excursions to Furnivall Club down in Hammersmith and over to Gloucester, where the sharp Oxford law could not pursue us, to get some water time in and improve our technique. To supplement that, we got plenty of land training done on the ergs, in the ‘tank’ facility at the university sports centre, and hit some weights to round it all off. Rowers often say ‘ergs don’t float’, but they’re such brilliant fun that you can’t skip them entirely.

Mindful that people might theoretically want to do some revision, we did do things other than rowing, getting together for communal meals, merriment and to chill out; training camp really helps to integrate novices and seniors into one club. A huge thank you is in order to our coach Jack and his moustache for his help – hopefully the experience and fitness gained on this camp will translate into some monstrous 2k times going down this week and our rivals getting humiliated in Torpids.