Downing College Boat Club

Hi! I’m Will, a fourth year Earth Sciences student and the Men’s + NB captain for this year. I’ve been a member of DCBC since right at the start of my first Michaelmas term in 2021, and having rowed before coming to Cambridge, I was thrown straight into the deep end in the M2 VIII.  Even coming in as a fresher, I felt very included by all the seniors in the boat club, which has gone on to be a huge part of my life here for the last three years. There’s nothing else to match the community and excitement you get in the club around the big races, and the socials and especially the boat club dinners!

My first big race at the club was Fairbairns at the end of the first term. A great first taste of the college rowing experience, the 4.3k race all the way down the Cam was definitely gruelling, but knowing that the whole club was at the bank cheering us down from the boathouse helped us push through. Going into Lent term, we were lucky to have most of the crew stay the same from the previous term so there was a great platform to build on. The January training camp on the Cam was really fun (despite the cold weather!), and meant for the first time I got to know all the other freshers that had come in as novices the same time I joined in the seniors. Lents was a tough campaign, with three hard row-overs and a well earned bump up on the last day. And going into Mays, the challenge was even tougher, with the boat much higher up the start order. Ending the week scraping by with a hard and very close rowover where the FaT crew behind got to overlap just as good as a bump for all of us in the crew, easily overcoming the disappointment of -2 from the previous days.

In 2022, the year got off to a good start over Michaelmas with a really solid result for M1 in the Fairbairn’s race even when we had to pull up novices into the crew.  Building again through January, M2 looked set to be a strong crew with tons of experience in the boat. Even with some hard conditions on the river, we set out strong to get a bump up on our first two days. However, the Cam had other plans, with flooding meaning we lost our third day of rowing, and with it our chance of getting a ‘true’ blades campaign. Even so, we pushed hard on the last day to make a great +3 campaign, though with hunger for more.

Easter term got underway and with a serious amount of commitment and dedicated coaching from Sam and Simon, we felt solid going in to bumps once again. Our first day gave us a quick bump on Darwin, and the second a harder fight to just after Grassy chasing Clare who had managed to escape us through the weather in Lents. On the Friday, we knew we’d have to go off hard to catch a fast Pembroke crew before they caught a slow Sidney boat in front. However, our stroke seat Mario had other ideas, ten steps ahead of the rest of us. With a slower rate imposed until the crews in front bumped out, we had plenty left to give to go for the overbump, and barely reached the plough before the tired crew from St Edmund’s gave in. With the final day gifting us a Homerton first boat fresh from their May ball, we had managed an incredible +6 for superblades! Rowing up past the Mays crowds with the flag waving behind us is truly amazing and an incredible memory, even more so knowing that as a crew we had managed to go up nine over the last two terms. BCD and the other rowing festivities of may week were celebrated to the absolute fullest.

Coming into third year, sadly I had to miss the end of term Fairbairn’s race for fieldwork, having spent the term as the live-in sub for whichever boat was short that week, resulting in a mixture of M1 and M2 rowing. The Banyoles camp in January was a huge reminder of all that is so great about rowing, with a beautiful week on the lake in Spain allowing us to progress so much. Not to mention the trips down to the local pubs with the club in the evenings, while still managing to cram in my last minute dissertation work. Lents term saw shuffling in and out of M1 as we struggled through the worst weather and flooding on the Cam in years. I finally ended up in the seven seat of M2 with just one week to go before bumps started.  Despite the crew volatility, we fought hard to go up four and win the crews third set of blades in a row,  up to being the 4^th M2 crew on the river. In a totally-not-foreshadowing way, it was great to be part of a successful crew that knew we could build on to success in Mays too. Easter holiday training has never been quite so hard!

Mays started off well, despite injury causing some further crew shuffling. We got plenty of decent training in before exams started ramping up hard, but then an unfortunate series of events and crew illnesses culminating in my three-day trip to Addenbrooke’s firmly derailed our well-laid plans. Whilst last-minute subs tried just as hard as the rest of the crew, there’s no substitute for getting the hours in especially in the stroke seat, and sadly all I could do was watch the tragic M2 spoons campaign unfold from the bank as I umpired alongside. Fortunately, there were some positives too, as being confined to the bank allowed me to witness the great M1 campaign, the return of M3 to the river, and incredibly strong rowovers from W1 and W2. This week reinforced to me the supportive and friendly community I am so proud to be a part of at Downing, and why I wanted to take on this role this year.

I’m really excited for this year, my last here at DCBC. Through commitment to training from everyone, and through taking advantage of the exceptional facilities and resources we have access to at the club, great things are possible for every crew. Whether your first year at DCBC or your tenth, I’m looking forward to involving everyone at the club to build boats that can be the best on the river!

Feroces ad Mortem,

Will Pizii – Men and NB Captain 2024/25