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Message board > Members' Opinion Polls > Members' poll: Which FaT/BPBC boat will complete the Fairbairns course in the shortest time?

Which FaT/BPBC boat will complete the Fairbairns course in the shortest time?

BPBC 1st VIII (crew unknown)		49%

BPBC 2nd VIII (crew unknown)		2%

FaT Fairbairn VIII (Thorne, Holland, Chamberlain et al.)		11%

FaT Low Commitment VIII (Grundy, Peacock, Lea-Cox et al.)		13%

FaT Grad VIII (Copland, Cuthbert, Miller et al.)		15%

FaT Gents VIII (Bullock, Dunleavy, Minch-Dixon et al.)		0%

FaT Women's Fairbairn IV (Powell, Russell, Dennis, Sampson, Lee) [+1 min as shorter course]		11%

Total: 47 members' votes

by mjb - Sun 23rd Nov 2003, 6:15pm

Will BPBC be bringing the wormhole generator with them again this year ?

by Dubya - Sun 23rd Nov 2003, 11:09pm

this year they won't need it, I hear

by "Training makes a crew!" - Mon 24th Nov 2003, 10:26am

Votes so far: FaT Fairbairn VIII (Thorne, Holland, Chamberlain et al.): 6%
FaT Low Commitment VIII (Grundy, Peacock, Lea-Cox et al.): 18%

Who honestly thinks that the 'Low Commitment VIII' will go faster than the 1st VIII?! No way.

by Dubya - Mon 24th Nov 2003, 11:21am

after seeing them today, I agree

by dw229 - Mon 24th Nov 2003, 12:07pm

You mean seeing yourself John?

by Dubya - Mon 24th Nov 2003, 12:08pm

to be fair though, the women will almost surely finish the 4s course in a shorter time than the mens time less 1 minute. 2 or 3 minutes would have been a fairer normalization.

by Dubya - Mon 24th Nov 2003, 12:08pm

dw229 said: You mean seeing yourself John?

no of course not

by dw229 - Mon 24th Nov 2003, 12:12pm

With a muppet at 3, I have to agree... (but still voted for us)

I just looked at last year's women's finishing times and saw they were about a minute quicker. I think they were anyway...

by results archive - Mon 24th Nov 2003, 12:23pm

Dubya said: to be fair though, the women will almost surely finish the 4s course in a shorter time than the mens time less 1 minute.

Then why haven't you voted for them??!

I'm with Dan, though...

                  2002  2001  2000  1999
women's IV        14:54 12:45 12:41 14:03
BPBC's/FaT (best) 14:56 13:38 13:23 14:57

One minute seems roughly right but does indeed seem to put them out of contention, barring a v. good performance....

by Man on the inside - Mon 24th Nov 2003, 6:26pm

My sources reveal the BPBC boats to stack up something like this atm:

1st
Carbonnel
Robson
Fisher A
Maltarp
Glass
Darley
Withers
Pickard/Rose
Blackburn

2nd
Liu
Rose/Pickard
Dewire
Backhouse
Were
Hogley
Robinson
Fisher G
Ponsonby

For those to whom these mean little, I should point out that:

The 1st viii contains:

- 4 people who came 3rd in the Head of the Charles this year

- 1 category winner from last week's erg champs

- 1 Blue

- 2 Lwts

- numerous triallists

- 2 ironmen

and about a 6:20 average 2k time

The 2nd viii is made up from 4 people who have been Head of the River, 7 and 6 from the Fairbairn VIII of '98, the stroke of the 2nd May VIII '00 and a Henley day 1 winner from this year.

by dw229 - Mon 24th Nov 2003, 6:46pm

To add to the stats - the low commitment VIII contains:

1 Lwt
1 Granta colour
4 May colours
2 2nd May colours (1 having rowed in the 1st Div)

Average 2k is probably somewhere around 6:45

by mjb - Mon 24th Nov 2003, 7:11pm

And FaT M1 has

2 May Colours
4 2nd May Colours
4 of the Uni IV's 2nd div. winning crew from this term.
3 of last year's 2nd div. winning crew.

Av.2k around 6.45-6.50, I reckon.

by pedantic - Mon 24th Nov 2003, 8:13pm

"2 ironmen"

aren't they going to be very heavy and not very flexible?

by Dubya - Mon 24th Nov 2003, 10:47pm

pedantic said: aren't they going to be very heavy and not very flexible?

"yes, dear"

by dw229 - Mon 24th Nov 2003, 11:22pm

Cor...ze bitches really love BPBC don't they?

by mjb - Mon 24th Nov 2003, 11:22pm

pedantic said: "2 iron men"

aren't they going to be very heavy and not very flexible?

They could sit in the stern and really raise the bows out of the water, maybe ? And they're probably quite strong and able to put a lot of power down.

by Simon - Tue 25th Nov 2003, 9:31am

"2 ironmen"

When ironmen are doing ironman competitions, do they have to be really careful during the swimming bit to make sure they don't start rusting?

by Let's not get carried away - Tue 25th Nov 2003, 10:16am

Man on the inside said:

and about a 6:20 average 2k time

Hmmmm. Perhaps a bit optimistic to say we still have a 6:20 average erg. Remember we have Andy dragging back the crew average with his recent 6:37!

Anyone got any good gen on which crews CUBC are entering? How far ahead will they finish? How many times will their empachers hit the bank?

by jpd - Tue 25th Nov 2003, 10:30am

Anyone got any good gen on which crews CUBC are entering? How far ahead will they finish? How many times will their empachers hit the bank?

Fairbairn crews haven't been announced yet.

Rob (our boatman) has bought small fins and A4 rudders, so hopefully we'll get round the corners.

by "dear" - Tue 25th Nov 2003, 12:10pm

Simon said: When ironmen are doing ironman competitions, do they have to be really careful during the swimming bit to make sure they don't start rusting?

no: they grease themselves up like channel swimmers do. i'd be more worried about sinking actually

by mjb - Tue 25th Nov 2003, 12:17pm

"dear" said: no: they grease themselves up like channel swimmers do. i'd be more worried about sinking actually

surely being ironmen, they don't have to breathe and could just run along the bottom ?

by engineer - Tue 25th Nov 2003, 12:24pm

mjb said: surely being ironmen, they don't have to breathe and could just run along the bottom ?

think of the drag

by Mike - Tue 25th Nov 2003, 12:40pm

engineer said: think of the drag

They do it in a dress and make-up?

by jmg - Wed 26th Nov 2003, 4:07pm

Let's not get carried away said: Hmmmm. Perhaps a bit optimistic to say we still have a 6:20 average erg.

Perhaps not right now, but the average PB would be pretty impressive, but that's as it should be for an alumni crew!

by Ingers - Wed 26th Nov 2003, 8:17pm

I was actually referring to average PB, though the current average would still be pretty good!

by Dubya - Thu 27th Nov 2003, 11:27pm

41 votes! that's a lot of people on our website!!

by Gent - Thu 27th Nov 2003, 11:32pm

unfortunately, none of them for the Gent's VIII!

by Dubya - Thu 27th Nov 2003, 11:35pm

do you expect to be faster than all the others listed?

by mjb - Thu 27th Nov 2003, 11:40pm

FaT M1 have caught up with the L-C VIII, but the Grads have a surprising number of votes.
Interesting to see that most people have gone for BPBC I.

by Gent - Thu 27th Nov 2003, 11:42pm

Well I suppose I didn't exactly vote for us - and I'm not expecting us to be quicker than all of those crews - but it would be nice to avoid getting 0% 2 weeks running!

by Simon - Fri 28th Nov 2003, 7:45am

mjb said: FaT M1 have caught up with the L-C VIII, but the Grads have a surprising number of votes.
Interesting to see that most people have gone for BPBC I.

Well, with that sort of insightful analysis, Peter Snow must be running scared.

by Dubya - Fri 28th Nov 2003, 12:12pm

If Martin wants more hits, he'll now reveal the website's next new feature, a Fairbairns fantasy betting ring, offering odds adjusted according to poll results and bets placed. (Mini-bumpsdaq but without the stock price aspect)

by Becca - Sat 29th Nov 2003, 12:04pm

Go 1st women's iv!
I'll be racing fairbairns too, but with my Oxford crew. We'll be in a Maggie boat, with Maggie blades, but still support us - please!

by Ingers - Sat 29th Nov 2003, 2:29pm

Becca said:

"...with my Oxford crew."

"...We'll be in a Maggie boat"

"...with Maggie blades"

"but still support us"

Are you quite mad?

by jmg - Sun 30th Nov 2003, 9:38am

Dubya said: If Martin wants more hits, he'll now reveal the website's next new feature, a Fairbairns fantasy betting ring, offering odds adjusted according to poll results and bets placed.

Well I'm going to be selling the Grad VIII short on that basis.

by obsessed techy geek in need of shrink - Sun 30th Nov 2003, 6:21pm

47 votes?! cool. This makes me happy. As does an average of 45,000 page downloads per week over the last month; not bad.

However, I demand that everyone who's able takes lots of nice pictures of people rowing Fairbairns, because I won't be here... :-(

by Dubya - Sun 30th Nov 2003, 11:59pm

It's interesting that the graph of hits by time of day has changed significantly. It used to be that most hits were in the evening (8-10pm) with a huge spike at 11pm to midnight. But now most hits are between 3 and 6 in the afternoon (although the increase around midnight is still present, in smaller proportion). This suggests a lot more hits from bufties when slacking in the mid-afternoon... compared to students who check last thing before going to bed.

by RTT - Mon 1st Dec 2003, 8:54am

Could be students getting bored in the afternoon (lighting up is now around 1615) and bufties returning from the pub?

by Little "Mathmo" Jenners - Fri 5th Dec 2003, 8:52pm

I like the fact that you all commented that we should win it statistically but very few of you actually voted for us. We did 13.57 which is over a minute faster than 15.03, I think, correct my maths if I'm wrong!