Harry Parker: A Good Coach

Above is a teaser of yesterday's programme 60 Minutes Sport which followed legendary Harvard coach Harry Parker last year. Rowing web site Row2k wrote about the programme yesterday, read it here.

An Act of Waugh

Sebastian, Charles and Aloysius on the river.

Tim Koch writes,

The recent HTBS item ‘Among Hard Drinking Hypocrites and “Eight Good Men”’ gives me the excuse to write about a favourite novel and to speculate why the 1981 Granada Television Production of Evelyn Waugh’s Brideshead Revisited is one of the very rare examples of a film or TV series that does justice to a much loved book (unlike the 2008 film of the same name). Using an old HTBS trick, I will then justify my self-indulgent ramblings by pointing out the rowing references.

Waugh’s story is told in flashback and recounts the twenty year relationship of the ‘middle class’ (though to most of us, rather wealthy) Charles Ryder with the aristocratic Anglo Catholic Marchmain family. There are many reasons not to like this book. It concerns the ‘problems’ of a group of a highly privileged group at a time when most people struggled just to survive. Waugh himself said that they ‘had no troubles but those they made themselves’. Few, if any of the characters are likeable. Brideshead is profoundly anti-egalitarianism and seems to imply that life and the social order before the First World War was superior (which it certainly was for those who inhabit the novel). Though Waugh was a Roman Catholic convert, most of the book seems to read as criticising or mocking Catholicism and it is only with the highly unsatisfactory ending (the death of Lord Marchmain) does it ‘return to the faith’. It is difficult not to feel cheated.

What then is the attraction of Brideshead? Well, the prose is beautiful, the descriptions of lovely things and places are delightful and the personalities are richly drawn. It produces a form of ‘nostalgia’ for something that most of us never knew and that few of us would attempt to justify. The Granada TV production staring Jeremy Irons, Sir John Gielgud and Sir Laurence Olivier fully complements the novel. I saw the television series before I read the book. You could do it the other way around. Either way is satisfactory, a rare achievement.

The story of how the television production was able to do what it did is an interesting one and it concerns a unique period in British TV history. Until 1982 Britain had only three television stations. Two of them were run by the BBC and carried no advertising. Independent Television (ITV) was the only commercial channel and so, lacking any competition, could charge advertisers what they wished – and did. They could also treat these advertisers with something approaching contempt – and did. Commercial television was making so much money that even the new right wing Thatcher Government decided to impose an extra levy on their profits, above the normal business tax. The only way to avoid this new levy was to put more money into television production. It was a simple incentive to make good television and the Brideshead production team took full advantage of it. They were on location all over the world for two years and spent lavishly, often on details that would not actually be noticed on screen (for example, the books on Ryder’s shelves are the ones mentioned by Waugh). Whatever the directors did, the ‘suits’ at Granada (one of ITV’s regional stations, based in Manchester) kept on signing the cheques. The programme was originally planned to be six hours long but it eventually ran for eleven. All this was to cover a relatively short book (my Penguin Modern Classics edition runs to 325 pages). Another unusual occurrence is that the book is almost a ‘shooting script’ for the film, following its chronology closely. Brideshead finally cost £4.5m / $6.8m, which was a lot of money thirty years ago. The result is acknowledged to be one of British television’s finest productions.

The ‘sweatered and muffled throng’ on its way to the river...

The few rowing references in Brideshead are, not surprisingly, in the Oxford scenes. The opening ‘flashback’ starts during the four days of ‘bump’ racing known as Eights Week, an event which drives the two young aesthetes (Sebastian and Charles plus teddy bear) to flee the town. Ryder’s college servant, Lunt, complains:

“..... What do they want with dancing? I don’t see the reason in it. There never was dancing before in Eights Week. (The Founder’s Ball) now is another matter being in the vacation, but not in Eights Week as if teas and the river wasn’t enough. If you ask me, sir, it’s all on account of the war. It couldn’t have happened but for that.” For this was 1923 and for Lunt, as for thousands of others, things could never be the same as they had been in 1914.

On his arrival at Oxford, Ryder is given fatherly advice by his cousin Jasper: ...he was in his fourth year and, the term before, had come within appreciable distance of getting his rowing blue... a considerable person in college.

Cousin Jasper sports his Leander tie and a general air of disapproval.

Waugh writes that Jasper wears a Leander tie and the 1981 TV production has him in a Leander ‘city’ tie, dark blue with little pink hippopotamus motifs. This minor detail is perfect – in 1923 one would not ordinarily wear the famous cerise ‘regatta’ tie with a suit. Jasper’s advice (you either want a first or a fourth.... go to a London tailor; you get better cut and longer credit..... don’t treat dons like schoolmasters; treat them as you would the vicar at home... beware the Anglo Catholics...) goes largely unheeded.

The most amusing rowing reference comes from the flamboyant Anthony Blanche, ..... the ‘aesthete’ par excellence, a byword of iniquity from Cherwell Edge to Somerville..... who, after an alcohol fuelled luncheon in college:

....stood on the balcony with a megaphone which had appeared surprisingly among the bric-á-brac of Sebastian’s room, and in languishing, sobbing tones recited passages from The Waste Land to the sweatered and muffled throng that was on its way to the river....

And then, stepping lightly into the room, “How I have surprised them! All b-boatmen are Grace Darlings to me.” Watch that scene below:



A pure delight.

Keen Eddie.. how do you like me so far?

In 2003, Fox Network here in America showed an action-comedy called Keen Eddie. Thirteen episodes were made but Fox only aired seven of them, while the TV-channel Bravo picked up the show and ran all the episodes in 2004. Watching the show in 2003, I really enjoyed it as there were plenty of funny American-British culture clashes. Yes, most of them were the stereotyped kind, but hey, it is comedy. I do not know if it was ever shown in England, I doubt it.

The plot in short, Keen Eddie is about the New York police detective Eddie Arlette, played by Mark Valley, who messes up a case in New York and is sent to London to wrap up the case. Eddie solves the case with the help of Inspector Monty Pippin (Julian Rhind-Tuut) and somehow manages to impress Superintendent Nathanial Johnson (Colin Salmon) of New Scotland Yard who offers him a job at Scotland Yard. Working in London, Eddie is renting a flat which is also occupied by Fiona Bickerton, played by Sienna Miller. Fiona does not want Eddie to stay in the flat, but he threatens to tell her mother, who owns the flat, that Fiona is not at the university studying, which they believe, instead she is working in a high-end perfume shop. Added to this mix is Eddie’s ill-behaved bull terrier Pete, which Inspector Pippin managed to get out from quarantine by claiming that Pete is a famous police dog.

Eddie is flirting with Superintendent Johnson’s assistant Carol Ross (Rachael Buckley), whom he calls ‘Ms. Moneypenny’. Her replies to his questions about how she is doing always have a sexual inclination, which only Eddie (in his fantasy, maybe) can hear, no one else. Catching a bad guy, Eddie has a catchphrase: ‘Hi, I’m Eddie... how do you like me so far?’

As the TV show first was cancelled, I bought the DVD set when it came out (unfortunately, it is not the original music from the TV series), and every evening for a week I have watched the show again, and I still find it entertaining. As Eddie is moving around in London, I have paid special attention to if any rowers can be seen in the background when Eddie is by the Thames, but no. However, in one of the episodes, when Fiona is talking on the phone with Eddie, in the background a TV set is showing rowing, I think from Henley Royal Regatta. This is in the episode called 'Keeping up Appearances' in which Eddie inherits an old Bentley with a chauffeur from an eccentric lady. The scene with the rowing on TV begins at 36:43 and runs to 37:18. Watch it here below (all Keen Eddie episodes are to be found on YouTube). Enjoy...

A New Series about Rivers in Ireland

A new tv programme in Ireland starts its series with featuring the River Barrow.

Greg Denieffe writes from England,

RTÉ, the Irish national radio and television channel, has started a new series called Abhainn (River), which is an Irish language programme (with English subtitles) exploring the country’s rivers. The series begins by examining local stories, both ancient and new, about the River Barrow.

My home town Club, Carlow Rowing Club, are featured from approximately six minutes in. It is in the RTÉ Player for another 18 days. I am sure the readers of the HTBS will enjoy it.

The Morning After the Boat Race...

For those of you who did not understand a thing about yesterday's entry, above you will have the opportunity to watch 8 minutes of the first episode of Jeeves & Wooster, the most entertaining TV-series ever.... It begins with the morning after the Boat Race...

Tufte On The Thames

One of the most popular post on HTBS so far this year is Tim Koch’s interview with the Norwegian Olympic sculling champion Olaf Tufte, “Olaf Tufte: “You can always hear the boat sing a little more…”, posted on 9 January. Tim’s rowing club, Kensington Rowing Club by Hammersmith Bridge had agreed to organise a little rowing competition on the Thames between one of their club fours (“England”) and a Norwegian team. The Scandinavian crew  (“Norway”) actually only had two real rowers, Olaf Tufte and Bjørn Jostein Singstad, and then two hosts from a tremendously popular television show in Norway, Senkveld med Thomas og Harald (‘Late night with Thomas and Harald’) with Thomas Numme and Harald Rønneberg.

The show has now aired in Norway, and a short version of the rowing race is now available on YouTube, Tim writes in an e-mail. Below is the video clip, it is all in Norwegian, but never mind, you do not need to understand what they are saying, it is entertaining as it is! Tim is the welcoming host (and he is speaking British-English, of course). But before you watch the clip, do read Tim’s 9 January article once more – click on the link above. Enjoy!

Downton Abbey & Vesta RC

Tonight, the PBS TV channel here in the USA is going to show the second episode in the second series of Julian Fellowes’s Edwardian drama, Downton Abbey. According to an article in the British newspaper the Daily Telegraph 4.2 million people turned on the television last Sunday to watch the previous episode created by the British ITV. I have to confess that I was one of these viewers (sitting next to Mrs. B.), and I enjoyed myself immensely to once again see the characters from last year’s first series. (On this side of the pond, we are some months behind, as the last episode in the second season was shown in Britain at Christmas that just passed.)

Yes, I am aware that I am watching a ‘soap opera’, but it is well-played, although – and here Baron Fellowes of West Stafford has to excuse me – I think that the script has its weak spots. But never mind, what is mostly shown here in the USA is so dreadfully bad, both when it comes to the script and acting, that Baron Fellowes’s ‘opera’ is a pure delight to watch. Thank god for public TV in America! This second series of the show is time-wise covering the First World War, and now I am finally getting to why I am actually mentioning Downton Abbey on HTBS.

The other day, the latest item I won on eBay.com arrived in my mail box: a Christmas card from 1914. In this case, it is the sender that is the interesting part, Vesta Rowing Club at Putney. The members of the club send their fellow club members ‘who are serving their King and Country’ … their Heartiest Good Wishes this Christmastide.’

I am not certain how many of Vesta RC’s members died during the Great War, but I surely agree with H.B. Wells in his Vesta Rowing Club: A Centenary History (1969), when he writes, ‘too many of our young oarsmen did not return’.

It seems a fire in 1936 destroyed parts of the club’s archives. However, members still, when Wells’s book was published, remembered the ‘gratitude’ shown towards the club in 1920 by the staff and patients of St Dunstan’s, whose mission was and still is ‘to help blind ex-Service men and women to lead independent and fulfilling lives.’ St Dunstan’s was founded by Arthur Pearson, owner and founder of the Daily Express who himself went blind in 1913. During the War, Vesta RC’s R.J. Calcutt (club president 1905-1919) had taken the initiative to offer ‘war-blinded men’ at St Dunstan’s, rowing at Vesta. The ex-Service men were taught rowing by the club’s members. The hospitalised man is then another tie-in to Downton Abbey’s second series.

Please, see also "Vesta RC At War 1914-1918", on Monday, 23 January, 2012.

The Winklevosses On The Simpsons...

Tomorrow, Sunday, 15 January, the Winklevoss brothers will be featured on The Simpsons in the USA. The episode is titled “The D’oh-cial Network”. Read more here. HTBS has decided to not comment on the short clip above…

Olaf Tufte: “You Can Always Hear The Boat Sing A Little More...”

Olaf teaches Thomas everything he knows – in 20 minutes. Harald looks on.

HTBS’s Tim Koch’s Auriol Kensington Rowing Club had some foreign celebrities visiting the club last Saturday, Tim writes...

It is not often that a group of young master rowers from a middle ranking rowing club get to race against one of the great scullers of the day. It is even less often that they beat him. However, this is what happened at Auriol Kensington Rowing Club in Hammersmith, London, on Saturday 7 January. The circumstance, as you may have already guessed, were fairly unusual.

Team Norway: Bjørn, Harald, Thomas, and Olaf.

One of the most popular television shows in Norway is Senkveld med Thomas og Harald (‘Late night with Thomas and Harald’). In-between their studio interviews they show recordings of various ‘challenges’ that the two presenters have undertaken. They decided that one of these should be a Norwegian rowing crew racing a British crew on the Thames. To this end they recruited the finest sculler in Norway and, indeed, the world, Olaf Tufte. Olaf has been the reigning Olympic champion since he won the single sculls in Athens in 2004 and Beijing in 2008. He also won the World Championships in 2001 and 2003. A good start. They then got Bjørn Jostein Singstad, a young rower with the Norwegian National Squad. Not bad. Unfortunately, the next two members of the quadruple scull were Thomas and Harald themselves. Neither of them had ever rowed. They had no time to learn. Harald had just broken his arm. However, this was not a problem for the television people as, of course, the sole object of the exercise was to make amusing TV for a non-rowing audience. Thus Thomas got about 40 minutes of training, half on land and half on water. He sat at ‘3’ behind Olaf, who was at stroke. Bjørn sat at bow. Harald, one arm in a sling, sat at ‘2’, without any oars but with a small Norwegian flag to wave in encouragement. Umpire Martin Gill also had to do a lot of flag waving at the start but the race soon settled down and the result, perhaps not surprisingly, was a win for Ali Boileau, Hugh Mackworth-Praed, Harry Powell, and Nick Hubbard of ‘Team Britain’. I suspect that, in the future, they will tell their grandchildren of the day that they beat Olaf Tufte - but without going into the details. I know that I would.

The finish: Team GB beats Team Norway.

Team Norway, umpire and safety boat return from the finish.

I, of course, had to take advantage of having a great Olympian in the Auriol Kensington clubhouse. Firstly, I photographed the possible 2012 Olympic sculling champion under a picture of the 1912 winner (Kensington Rowing Club’s Wally Kinnear). Secondly, I asked Olaf for an interview - which he kindly gave.

The 1912 Champion and the 2012(?) Champion.

What is your form like at the start of the Olympic year?
I think that I am well prepared. In the winter, I do a lot of ergs and I feel that I am on the right track.

Are you defiantly in the single for the 2012 Olympics?
Nothing is ever definite in rowing but that is what I am aiming for and yes, at the moment, I am.

After winning two Olympic titles, what keep you motivated?
You can always be a little bit better, you can always hear the boat sing a little bit more, a little bit longer..... What keeps me in rowing is that it is a big happy family and the best thing I know is to compete against my good friends...... The one who is going to win in London will be better than the one who won in Beijing and Athens and so on... So as long as you think that you can be better than you were, that is the motivation.

Can you win a third Olympic title?
(Olaf fixes me with a steely gaze. I feel a little nervous...)
If I thought that I couldn’t, I would not be here.

You won the Olympic title for a second time in 2008 despite not winning much in the preceding years. Will it be the same in 2012?
True, I have not won much since Beijing. I think the reason for that is that I have been doing a lot of other stuff outside of rowing.... But in the approach to the Olympics...... I have cleared away anything that takes away my energy.... I am focusing more and more on the rowing and everything that comes with it, I am not known for resting..... I think that I am doing some good things now and I have an OK plan but in the end we will see if it is good enough.

Tell me more about your plan.
I am not doing anything very different to what I have done, I am actually going back to the things that I did in 2008. I have been doing more ergs during the winter like I did in '08 which was not too bad a choice. Then I will probably do more speed work than I have done. I have a new coach (Carsten Hassing*). He is more about higher rating, not low rate and hard push, so we fight a little bit against each other, I want to do the heavy stroke and he wants a high rate. So with that little struggle and fight I hope we will get the best out of both of them and it will bring me even closer to success.

Who do you think are the scullers to beat in 2012?
Myself.

OK...., and then.....?
... It’s Mahé (Drysdale, NZ, third in Beijing)... Ondřej (Synek, Czech, second in Beijing) ... Alan (Campbell, Britain, fifth in Beijing) will of course be a big one on his home course.., you never know about Marcel Hacker... then you have the Swede, Lassi (Karonen) but I don’t think he will take the medals, the others are too strong. You have some stars coming up, you have the Azerbaijan guy (Aleksandr Aleksandrov)..., the Cuban (Angel Fournier)... both trying to fight their way into the finals.

Excuse the slightly parochial question but how strong do you think Britain’s Alan Campbell is?
If he is capable of winning this should be his year. The pressure of competing on his home ground will be a big challenge for him, even if he says it is not a problem, it will always be that way. We will have to see if he can turn that pressure into energy. But he is a great sculler, really fast, really strong, so he is one of the guys you have to watch out for.

Olaf, thank you very much and good luck in the Olympics.

If you want to see a great example of Olaf’s ability to put it all together when it really counts (and at the last minute), look at the penultimate 250 metres of the Athens final:



Olaf also mentions that he and his coach, Carsten Hassing, who successfully has coached parts of the Canadian National Team, have discussed the possibility of combining other rowing philosophies, such as higher stroke ratings, with the proven Norwegian technique.

Remember, he is going for his third Olympic title and, if successful, he would be the first single sculler to do this since the great Finn, Pertti Karppinen won in 1976, 1980, and 1984. Vyacheslav Ivanov of the USSR is the only other sculler to do this (1956, 1960, and 1964).

Let’s hope Olaf’s 2012 final is more successful that this outing:



(Olaf: “It can happen to the best…”)

See also AK News! & "Tufte On The Thames", 25 April, 2012.
* Corrections were made to this post on Thursday, 12 January, 2011.