About the Club

About First and Third T.B.C.

First and Third is the largest college boat club

First and Third Trinity Boat Club is the boat club of Trinity College in Cambridge, UK, the largest of the Cambridge University Colleges. We are the largest college boat club, typically teaching between 60 and 80 people to learn to row each year.

We aim to cater for everyone - with boats going out training anything between twice and five times a week. We therefore have up to as many 14 boats rowing in the Cambridge May Bumps - the highlight of the College rowing calender.

Rowing at Trinity College started, in 1825, with the formation of what became First Trinity Boatclub, closely followed by the forming of other Trinity Boat Clubs. The clubs all enjoyed a great deal of success throughout the 19th century, and though the Second Trinity Boat Club was dissolved due to insufficient membership, the standard of rowing remained excellent. The Clubs sent winning crews to the Olympics in various years and remained as one of the most formidable opponents at Henley Royal Regatta, winning the Grand on numerous occasions.

The 2nd men's boat preparing for the famous May Bumps

At the beginning of this century there were still two distinct boat clubs within college, the First Trinity BC and the Third Trinity BC. The latter was only open to those students coming up from Eton and Westminster, whereas the First Trinity BC catered for the rest of college. However, in 1947 the two clubs formally merged to enable them to remain competitive with the now much larger boat clubs from other colleges. The Third Trinity BC had suffered from an ever diminishing number of appropriate undergraduates, and as such was struggling to maintain its position on the river. The new club was named First and Third Trinity Boat Club, and is still one of the largest and most successful on the Cam.

For more on the history of the club click here.

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