Caius I had beaten Jesus 'easily' on Wednesday and after studying the stats hard I concluded that if our boys were going to win it wasn't going to be by very much. I got Pickard out on the bank and briefed him. Sure enough, it was a battle royal. John Dent had described the crew as needing to be a high rating 'terrier', and Tom Rose took this on board and drove them f***ing hard. John E's awesome steering also did them well - at Ditton they were up by 1 second. The Caius boys were clearly a larger crew, unfortunately, and in the stiff wind on the reach pulled out a lead of 3.2 s. This completed the disappointment of the day (3 narrow losses in 3 semi finals), but it was a comfort to hear that they had had a good row - they all looked utterly exhausted. (Martin)