The Eastern Sprints

We Went down to Worcester for the Eastern Sprints on Friday, the day before the rates. The bus was scheduled to leave from Newell Boat House at 11, and I started there from Adams House a half hour early to pack ray gear. It was a warm sunny morning in mid-May, and I walked slowly, enjoying the sun and following a Cliffie with good legs. She was wearing a yellow springdress, and she carried a bottle of Sea & Ski in one hand and a green book bag slung over her shoulder. I was feeling easy and smoodi, the way you do when you are tough and hard and in top condition, but a hint of pre-race tension was fluttering in my stomach. The Eastern Sprints is an all-or-nothing race for a lightweight crew—to win is lo be best, to lose is to have a bad season—and I couldn'i help being nervous. I had been rowing for sixseasons by then, in prep school and Allege,.but nobodyHire'v ei really calm for the big ones.

I stopped on Anderson Bridge jliid watched the Clliflie settle herself on the green lawn bank of the Charles and begin to rub.the Sea & Ski into her legs. Her legs were long and already sun-browned, and they reminded me ol Ann Haughton, a girl I had gone with and thought I was in love with. But that was^cKer. and now I had odier things to worry about, so I walked on to Newell.

DownstairsiU'WKTcled with the towel attendant and grabbed a couple of extra towels when he wasn't looking and ran upstairs. In the lounges the managers were giving out game bags and new racing shirts. My crew, the varsity lightweight, had not lost all season, so (continued on passe 120)Eastern Sprints(continued from page 109) that we still had our original shirts and were superslitiously attached to them. But the manager gave me a new one anyway, and 1 hung it in the back of my locker. Then I set the game bag on the bench in front of the locker and began to pack. The air was close and smelled of dried stale sweat and wet leather and liniment, but f took my time and packed carefully, because I didn't want to forget anything.

I was folding my extra sweat pants when I heard die coach, Ned Harrow, come in. He walked down the rows of lockers, speaking to everyone. When he got to mine, he said, "Well, how are you feeling?"

"Fine."

"That's good," he said. "I want to have a little strategy talk with you later."

"All right."

He walked off and I wondered what strategy he had in mind. I knew as much about stroking a Harvard-style race as I ever would, not that in theory there was anything difficult about it. Fast start, low through the middle, hell-for-leather at the finish. The trick was in execution, because die low-dirough-the-rniddle phase sometimes left you behind going into die last quarter mile. Maybe he had just been making conversation. He was a graduate student in archaeology and a good coach, and we got along well enough, but there was always a subtle strain. That was because I had beaten out Lowell Jay, the captain and a senior and Harrow's clubmate in the A.D., for stroke. Jay didn't have the brute power for emergencies, or the rhydim, and Harrow knew it, but you could tell he wished things had been different.

I packed the towels last and pulled the drawstrings of the game bag tight. Then I went to die shower room and took off my clothes and stood on the scales. The needle swung to the high side of 161. In lightweight rowing die crew has to average 155 and the maximum for any man is 160. I was supposed to make 158. I knew I would lose at least two pounds during die afternoon workout, and as long as I got down below 160 I was all right. Someone would give me leeway from there. My friend Tim Ohls, the five man, was the only other person on the boat who had trouble making weight, and two or three people in the bow were always low. My natural weight was somewhere between 165 and 170, and Ohls was a little bigger. Neither of us dared eat anything after Thursday lunch, and if the weather was cold so that we didn't sweat a lot in practice, Ohls had to cut out Wednesday dinner. As a freshman I had worried constantly about making weight, but now I had the technique, and it was merely an annoyance.

I dressed and went downstairs to the bus. It was not crowded yet, and I picked a window seat about halfway back. Lowell Jay was the first varsity man to get on. He nodded to me and said, "Good morning," but sat in front so that he could be near Harrow. I was glad Jay hadn't sat with me, because it was always awkward talking to him. Besides die stroke business, he was a friend of Ann Haughton, the girl I had thought I was in love with. His roommate since St. Paul's was a guy named Wickford Staples, who took Ann out a lot and appreciated me not at all. Ann had told me once that she and Staples had a standing joke about getting married, and Jay was always the best man. She said that Jay would be an asset to any wedding, because he looked like Richard Corey, clean-favored and imperially slim.

Tim Ohls got on, and as usual his hair was uncombed and hung over his forehead and his tie was a little askew and pulled down. He slung his game bag onto the overhead rack beside mine and said, "How they hanging?"

"One high, one low," I said.

He took off his jacket and stuffed it between die game bags. Then he sat down and stretched his legs. "Goddamn buses," he said. "No leg room. I'm high."

"I'm all right," I said. "A high sixty-one."

"I'm sixty-goddamn-three."

"You'll make it OK."

"I sure to hell hope so."

When everyone was on board, Harrow stood up in front and said, "Count down. Varsity first." Harry Borden, the bowman, yelled, "Bow," and Jay yelled, "Two," and so on, through me and cox'n Jerry Hayes. Then came the J. V. and freshmen and spares. When the last spare had sounded off, Harrow said, "All set, driver," and the bus lurched forward onto Storrow Drive.

During the ride, Tim and I talked shop, which was unusual. He was a history major, and before races we usually talked books or girls. We had arguments over Gide, who bored me, but we born liked Mark Twain better dian Melville, and Tim was about the only guy I knew at Harvard who really appreciated Hemingway. Most people couldn't keep Hemingway's public image separate from his work. But die Eastern Sprints were different from other races, and the pressure had been building since Monday, so diat it would have been phony to pretend we weren't thinking about business. Tim was good to talk shop widi, because it was more than just basiling over what you knew anyway. He was shrewd and noticed little things that people did wrong, and often he had ideas diat were wordi passing on to Harrow. We talked about our own boat, and then started in on the opposition. MIT figured to be toughest. We had beaten them before, but only by a half-length.

That had been on die Charles, rowing into a quartering head wind and a cross-chop, and MIT was a notoriously bad rough-water crew, so there was no telling what they'd be like if it was smooth. Tim figured Navy might be tough, too, because they sometimes improved vastly during a season, and Cornell was never bad. The rest were also-rans.

In Worcester we were to stay at the Lakeside Lodge, which was about a mile from Lake Quinsigamond. It was a two-story almost-new motel, and Harvard had rented the whole place. The lightweight crews were upstairs and the heavyweights on die ground floor. There was a ballup in the rooming assignments, and someone had put Tim in with Lowell Jay and me with Hayes, die cox. Tim and I had roomed together every road trip for two years, and it seemed to be inviting bad luck to break us up, so we tracked down Harrow and one of the managers and got things straightened around. By then it was one o'clock and everyone who didn't have to worry about weight went to lunch. Tim and I went to our room. It was hot and I turned on die air conditioning and flopped on one of the beds. Tim lay down on the odier. He said he was hungry. Then he said he was glad he wasn't rooming widi Jay, whom he detested.

I dozed awhile, with the nervousness and hunger jangling in my stomach, and when I woke, Tim was coming out of the bathroom. He grinned and said, "What a dump. A three-pounder at least."

A little later one of die managers came by and told us we had 15 minutes to dress and board the bus. We changed into our leadier-seated rowing shorts and booties and practice shirts, then went downstairs, carrying our sweat clothes.

At the boadiouse there were dozens of oarsmen milling around, taking shells in and out and standing talking. Most of our people stayed close together. Tim and I found the scales and checked diem out. I was still a high 161, with my clothes on, which was good. Harrow called for the varsity to get on die boat, but I told him to hang on, I had to get into my sweat clothes. He said, "No rush. I'll send the freshmen out." I got into my sweat pants and two sweat shirts and a rot-smelling bright-yellow rubber poncho. I felt lightheaded and was thirsty and it seemed as if the poncho was constricting my breathing.

We stood beside our shell, called die Class of '39, for 15 minutes before there was a space at dockside. Then Hayes said, "Ready all, hands on, out and away." We carried die shell out waist-high and swung it parallel to die lake. Hayes said, "Up and away," and we (continued on page 176)Eastern Sprints(continued from page 120) flipped the shell over our heads and lowered it into the water. We set the oars, pushed off, tied in and began working up the lake toward the course by fours. The sun was high and glaring hot off the water, so that sweat ran in salt-tasting streams along the sides of my nose into the corners of my mouth. The sweat pants rubbed and chafed at the backs of my legs. Harrow in a launch and the freshmen and J.V. were waiting for us at the foot of the course. All three crews worked up the course doing 20-stroke cadences, and then came back practicing racing starts. We passed dozens of other crews and once had to hold all and back down to avoid ramming the Yale heavies. The Yale coach said through an electric megaphone, "You can always tell a Harvard man," and everyone laughed.

After we had finished practicing starts, we did two 40-stroke cadences at 34. By the end of the second one I thought I was going to pass out from the heat, but no one else seemed to be bothered, and the boat was running smoothly. We were taking the J.V. regularly by a length, and the freshmen by a little more. We turned around again and began doing ten-stroke cadences, taking it up two each time. We worked up to 42, and then Harrow said, "All right, sky's the limit." Cockburn, the J.V. stroke, looked over at me and thumbed his nose. I threw him a finger. Harrow said, "Two to move, ready all, row," and I jammed everything on full power. I could feel the boat steady and fast-handed behind me, and I gave it a ride, driving flat out through each pull-through and jumping a little on each recovery. When we finished, Harrow was grinning and Cockburn shook his head and Hayes checked his watch twice before he said, "Forty-five plus."

Harrow said, "I got forty-six."

We took the boat home in one long row, and when we lifted it out of the water I almost lost my hold, I was so lightheaded. After we got it on the rack and dried off, we stripped for the weighin. I stood at the boat-bay door with a towel wrapped around my waist, letting the breeze blow cool over my body, not caring if anyone saw. Then an official called, "Harvard varsity," and I walked to the scales. Harrow and the Navy coach and the official were standing there with clipboards in their hands, and the official said, "Stroke." I knew I was all right, but was tense anyway. I took off the towel and wished I hadn't eaten Thursday breakfast and climbed on. The needle swung back and forth and steadied just below 158. Harrow smiled and jotted on the clipboard. The official said, "Seven." The boat was six pounds low in the aggregate, and Ohls was 159.

At the motel we showered and I put on a fresh shirt. We picked up Keith Butler, the seven man, who was rooming next door, and went out looking for ice cream. It was an old Harvard lightweight tradition to eat ice cream after weighin, and we did it every week, even though it almost gave Harrow ulcers. Ohls was ice-cream-eating champion by a wide margin. The night before the Princeton race, which we knew we were going to win, he had set a record by consuming three malts and five fudge sundaes. Harrow had heard about it and made a there-are-limits speech, but nobody paid much attention.

After the ice cream, we went back to the motel for dinner. They gave us good steaks and baked potatoes. Dessert was peach pie, but nobody could eat it. I was logy and sleepy from the food and the workout, and went to bed as soon as I finished eating.

Sometime during the night I woke and had to go to the bathroom, and when I got back to bed I was fully awake and knew it would be hard to get back to sleep. The air conditioner made a steady hum, while Ohls snored softly into his pillow. I began to think, although I didn't want to. First I thought about Ann Haughton and some of the good times we'd had—the cold bright November Saturday of the Yale game, with a fresh sharp wind that pinked her cheeks and a five-foot crimson-and-white wool scarf wound around her neck and thrown over her shoulder, or a dinner party I'd had for her at the Hasty Pudding on her 20th birthday, and then I drifted on to when we had broken up, and I remembered it very clearly.

We had been at a black-tie dinner dance in Marblehead, and I had wanted to leave early, because I danced awkwardly and always felt uncomfortable in a starched shirt, and because most of the people there were her friends and not mine. She was wearing a new white evening dress and her shoulders were fine-boned and slender, and her hair was fresh-washed and shining, and I had wanted to make love to her. She had come away with me, but instead of making love we had quarreled, and she made me take her back to her dormitory. The next morning we had had coffee together at the University Restaurant, and she said she thought it would be better if we didn't see each other so much.

I had been in a bad way then, and it was just lucky I'd had crew; crew kept me tired physically and absorbed mentally. It had been wild with Ann, and I thought sometimes that the wildness scared her, but I wasn't sure, and never did know exactly why she broke it off. But maybe she didn't know herself. The only person I had talked to about it was Ohls, and that hadn't been much help.

He'd said, "You got it bad, kid, and that ain't good." I tried to explain about her, and he said, "Hell, a skirt is a skirt is a skirt."

I said, "To hell with you, Ohls," and meant it, and it had taken a week to get back on our old basis.

By now I was not even drowsy and knew I would not sleep for hours. I had some Seconal, from never mind where, and took two capsules. I didn't use Seconal often, so that it worked quickly, and soon I felt the muscles in my neck loosening and a warmth running down my arms.

In the morning at breakfast, Harrow said, "No milk or butter. I don't want you guys eating anything that might curdle." We had to row our qualifying heat at 10:30, and after breakfast we lay around the rooms and lobby reading magazines and talking. I was glad we had the qualifying heat, because if there was anything I hated, it was sitting around slewing all day waiting for a 3:30 race. In our qualifying heat were Princeton, Columbia, Penn and MIT. All we had to do was beat two of them. I knew we could beat Penn or Columbia blindfolded, so I figured the morning row would shake us down and leave us loose for the big show.

We got on the bus at 9:45 and boated at 10. Rowing up to the start we were a little jittery and rough. Ohls washed out a couple of times, and Gavin Bancroft, the four man, caught a half crab on a start. Hayes kept saying, "Now for Christ's sake, settle down."

We were in lane three, because we were top-seeded crew. MIT, the third-seeded boat, was in four, and Princeton was in two. We backed down onto the stake boat, and the kid in the boat grabbed hold of our rudder. He knew his business and stretched out over the gunnel to hold us as far down course as possible. Hayes said, "My hand is down," which meant we were headed. I was set on my slide at the three-quarters position, ready for the start. Columbia backed and filled for a few minutes in lane five, and then the starter said, "Ready all, ready to row, rrrow.

We got off smoothly and well, without any crabs or checking. We were to row a regular full-throttle 30-stroke start, then settle low and play it by ear. At the end of ten, Hayes gave me a clocking, a 42, and I knew we could go higher. I was tempted to jack it up a bit, just to see what would happen, but we already had a deck length on Princeton and a seat or two on MIT. At the end of 30 we had six seats on Princeton and three on MIT. Hayes yelled, "All right, stroke going down. Stroke going down," and banged the sides with his knockers violently. I crept down the slide, slowing everything carefully. The boat started to dip to starboard, but didn't, and I rolled up and caught and we had accomplished the drop. Hayes' clocking was a 33 minus. MIT was at 37 or 38 still, and began to move by us. We were holding Princeton, and both Columbia and Penn were out of it.

By the 1000-meter mark, the halfway point, MIT had a full length on us and we were rowing stroke for stroke with Princeton. We had sagged to a 32, but were rowing sharply and cleanly and I could feel the unused power. I told Hayes to call a power ten, because I wanted to see if we could move on MIT. He yelled, "Power ten, power ten," and banged the sides. The boat jumped as if someone had lit off a dynamite charge under us, and at the end of the ten we had moved up a quarter-length. That satisfied me, and I took the stroke down, and down again, to a 28, so that we finished a half-length behind Princeton and two lengths behind Tech.

MIT crews were not noted for their suaveness, and this bunch began to shout and cheer as if they'd just won a gold medal at the Olympics. We looked at them in amazement for a minute, and then Ohls said in a loud, clear voice, "Flaming idiots eat mung."

Lunch was another steak and French fries. When he saw the French fries, Harrow got very upset and told everyone not to touch them. He went into the kitchen and we could hear him arguing with the chef. Finally the waiters brought us bowls of diced carrots. Harrow sat back down and said, "Now be sure you take salt pills and go easy on the honey and chocolate. It's going to be hot out there." He was chain-smoking, and I thought this was harder on him than on us. He was just as involved as we were, but it was out of his hands.

After lunch I thought I wanted to be alone and went to the room. I took a couple of salt pills and tried to read, but I couldn't concentrate. Then I tried to sleep, but that was impossible. I decided what I needed was company and went down to the lobby and got in a bridge game with Keith Butler and Jay and Harry Borden. My bridge was poor under the best of circumstances, and I reneged twice on the first hand. After the third hand I excused myself. I wanted to walk, but knew I should be resting. I was tight through my chest and my mouth was dry, in spite of the salt pills. It reminded me of once when Ann knew she was a week overdue for her period. I went back to the room and Tim and Hayes were shooting craps. Craps was more my kind of game than bridge.

At a quarter to three we got on the bus and rode to the boathouse. We had the bus to ourselves, because the freshmen were already on the water and the J.V.s were boating. We were the next-to-last race, with only the varsity heavies after us.

The riggers had been working on the shell, and its cedar-strip skin gleamed even in the dull light of the boathouse from the coating of linseed oil. Mick, the head rigger, who was usually unpleasant as a matter of policy, checked with each of us to make sure our slides and oarlocks had been functioning properly. We told him everything was OK, and he said, "I'm wishin' you the best of luck."

At 3:10 an official told us we were to boat in five minutes. Harrow called us into a corner of the boathouse and said, "well, there's not much I can say. You all know what you have to do. Cornell looked very fast this morning in the other heat, and I guess you know MIT isn't going to be joking around. But I think you're the best crew, so good luck." We shook hands all around and then went to the shell. On the dock, before we were ready to push off, Harrow took me aside and said, "Do whatever you have to. Don't let anybody get more than a length ahead of you at any time, and begin your sprint whenever you think it's necessary."

I said, "Right," and he said, "Good hunting."

Just after we had pushed away and were tying in, the freshmen docked. They had won easily and were laughing and joking and eager to collect their shirts. Behind me Keith Butler said, "The lucky little bastards."

We worked past the grandstands by fours. It felt good to be doing something, anything, and a little of the tension in my throat and chest dissipated. It was hot and windless and the crowd was big. We were rowing up the opposite shore from the grandstands, but I could make out the bright-coloured blotches of print dresses and school blazers. We rowed slowly to the 500-meter marker, and stopped there to watch the J.V.s come by. Harvard and Navy and MIT were all pretty much neck and neck, with Cornell rowing strongly about a half-length back. After the wakes from the officials' launches had died down, we began practicing five-stroke racing starts. The boat was as powerful and smooth as I had ever felt it. Hayes clocked the starts at between 42 and 44, and I knew we could go higher. As we were nearing the line, the J.V. heavies came by. Cornell and Wisconsin were ahead, and Harvard was rowing badly. The timing was sloppy and three was rushing his slide.

We worked behind the stake boats and took a last practice start, then came down on lane two. As we backed up to the stake boat, the kid in lane three recognized us and waved. This time he had MIT.

Our own stake-boat boy was an imbecile. He was small, only nine or ten years old, and he was afraid to lean out over the water. It was dangerous to be too close to the stake boat, because if there was any back check on the first stroke, we might crumple the rudder. Also, no one likes to be even a foot behind at the start. Hayes explained twice what to do, but the kid just shook his head. Then Ohls leaned out and said, "Stretch out, you little fink, or I'll come back there and drown you." We all laughed, but the kid swallowed and leaned out a little.

"See," Hayes said. "You'll be all right." The other crews were set, and I punched my oar gently with my fist. Finally the kid was holding us off as far as he could. Hayes said, "Touch it up, two." Jay took a short stroke to swing the bow. The palms of my hands were sweaty, and I made myself sit straight and breathe deeply. I could hear the growl of the motor in the officials' launch somewhere to port. Hayes said, "My hand is down," and I set myself.

The start came fast and sharp. "Ready all, ready to row, rrrow," and I wrenched the oar through the water. I took the two half-strokes fast, perhaps too fast, with no hesitation, but the crew stayed with me; then the three-quarter stroke and we were off. I was not thinking or calculating, just rowing as fast as I could. At the end of ten, Hayes stopped counting out loud and took a clocking. I knew we were high, but when he said, "Forty-six plus," I shook my head. He took another clocking and said, "The same." I grinned and glanced around. Three seats or better on MIT. Our boat was on dead-level keel, running without a tremor, and I wondered if maybe I could take it even higher.

At the end of 30 we dropped to a high 34. We had slightly better than a deck length on MIT. They began to creep up on us, but not as quickly as they had in the morning. There was a lot of noise— the singsong voices of the cox'ns mingling, the leather-on-steel, wood-on-water chunk of the catch, the rolling swish-rush of the slides—and I had to remember not to listen to anything but Hayes and my own sense of rhythm.

With 500 meters gone, we still had a seat or two on MIT and a half-length on Cornell. Navy, in lane five on the other side of Cornell, had crabbed or somehow blown the start and was two lengths back. I was rowing easily, consciously holding back. The crew was fresh and strong and rowing well and could hold any stroke I set without help from me. All I had to do was keep a steady beat. During the sprint it would be different and I would need every ounce of energy I had, and maybe more. We were still rowing a 34, and every now and then I checked the spacing. Even spacing of the oar puddles at 32 is considered good, and we were getting at least even spacing at 34.

By the thousand, MIT was a deck length ahead, but Cornell was a length 179 behind, and everyone else was out of it. I had Hayes take a clocking on MIT. They were rowing a 37, and I thought about going up two, but didn't, and instead told Hayes to call a power 20. He yelled, "Power twenty. Power twenty. Everything for twenty," and banged the knockers. I began to pull with everything myself and the boat kicked forward. It didn't jump the way it had in the morning, because in this race everyone had been pulling hard to start with, but there was always something extra you could get for a spurt. The stroke started to creep up, but I held it down, and at the end of 20 we were ahead of MIT again. Hayes shouted, "Hold 'em now. Hold 'em." As soon as we finished, MIT went up two. That was supposed to demoralize us. Immediately they got the lead back and began to move away. I asked Hayes how far to the final 500 meters, and he said, "Twenty strokes." When he talked to me he leaned forward and spoke at conversational pitch, but when he was yelling for the whole boat he pointed his megaphone downward and bounced the sound along the hull. My forearms were beginning to tire, and my feathering hand, the right, was tightening. I checked MIT out of the corner of my eye and saw that their rudderpost was even with me. Hayes looked at me, and I nodded.

"We're going up," he yelled. "Up two on the next stroke."

I cut my pull-through a little and shortened my slide time. The boat responded well and didn't dip or check. Hayes took a clocking of 35. I knew we had gone up more than one, so we must have sagged after the power 20. Hayes said to me, "We're not picking up anything," and yelled to the crew, "Keep it smooth. Keep it smooth. They have about a deck length on you."

I saw the 500-meter pole and nodded again. "Up two, up two. Smooth. Keep it smooth." I cut the pull-through short again, and noticed that my breath was beginning to burn. We still didn't make anything back, and Hayes' voice rose toward a scream. "Pull. Pull. Five hundred meters left. Five hundred meters to go." I nodded again, and again we went up. This time the boat somehow seemed to gather momentum. We had been rowing well before, but now we began to swing, to move with a power that was beyond technical competence or desire or a combination. Twice more I took it up, to 40 and 42, feeling the shell run fast and clean beneath me, and then we went to 44. Sweat was running into my eyes so that I couldn't see, but it didn't matter. The time for strategy was past; now it was a question of pure speed. Hayes shouted, "You're moving, on them, you're moving, drive it, drive, drive, drive," and everything was blur and motion. My legs were jelly, and my feathering hand was numb, but the stroke kept climbing, until it seemed we were in a constant pull-through, with no time for the recovery, a never-ending catch-drive-catch, and then Hayes was yelling, "Way 'n'uff, way 'n'uff," and we had crossed the finish.

I let myself sag forward across the oar and the boat skidded crabwise to a stop. Above the sound of my breathing I could hear the screaming of the crowd. My eyes were closed and I did not want to open them, because they were stinging from the sweat. My forearm muscles felt locked stiff and my things were trembling uncontrollably. Someone, Hayes or Keith Butler, patted my shoulder. I got my eyes open and asked, "Who won?"

Hayes shrugged, and said, "I couldn't tell. It was damn close."

"Find out," I said.

"Give 'em a minute," he said. "They'll probably have to develop the picture."

"Jesus."

But several minutes went by and the officials' launch didn't come and we heard nothing from the public-address system. It became possible to breathe almost normally, but my throat was raw, as if I had a bad cold. Finally Ohls cupped his hands and yelled at the judges' stand, "Who the hell won?"

Someone gargled over the P.A. and said, "You did, Harvard."

There was laughter from the grandstands, then cheering. Hayes and I shook hands and Butler kept punching me between the shoulder blades. When everyone calmed down, we docked in front of the grandstands. Harrow came running down the dock and shook everyone's hand and then we threw him in. He didn't have time to get his wrist watch off and swam around laughing and holding his left arm out of the water. Hayes tried to run away, but we caught him and threw him in, too, and then they got me. The water was cool and clean and I swam for a minute under the dock. I climbed out and a manager handed me a towel. When I had dried my head, I began to look around. Harrow was talking to some reporters, with water pouring out of the sleeves of his madras jacket, and then I saw Wickford Staples and Ann Haughton talking to Lowell Jay. Staples was wearing a St. Paul's blazer and an A.D. Club tie, and his hair was too long and too carefully combed. But Ann Haughton was tall and fresh and clean-lined as a racing shell. She saw me, and spoke to Staples, who looked over at me and looked away. Then Ann walked to me and we stood not speaking for a moment before she smiled her best bright smile and said, "Ben, congratulations."

"Thank you."

Someone tapped me on the shoulder and I turned. It was Frank Fuess, the crew reporter for The Boston Herald. "Well, stroke," he said, "it looks like you did it."

"Yes," I said.

"How about a pix of you and the pretty girl?"

I tried to say no, but he wouldn't pay any attention, and posed us with Ann holding my arm. He backed up and said, "Now stick out your chest and smile."

"Frank," I said, "I wish you——"

But he snapped the picture and said, "That's a sweet one."

Ann said, "Ben, I'm sorry," and smiled again. Her smile was so phony and she was so cool and poised that I wanted to say something sarcastic to shatter her composure, but I couldn't think of anything, and she walked away.

After that, a lot of reporters crowded around, and flashbulbs popped, and they had us throw Hayes in again for a news-reel photographer. People kept asking me stupid questions, which I tried to answer politely, until someone asked me for about the tenth time what I had been thinking when MIT was ahead of us with only 500 meters to go. I said, "That I wanted to beat the bastards."

There was a presentation ceremony, during which we each got a little silver cup. Then more pictures. The press wanted to know if Harrow planned to take us to Henley, and he said, "It's a question of money." That meant we were going, because the Friends of Harvard Rowing, who put up the money for Henley trips, were very generous.

Eventually the crowd thinned out and I was left alone. Everyone else had parents or a girl. Even Ohls had a girl, a Cliffie with brown hair pulled back in a bun and enormous breasts. Then Lowell Jay came up to me with a white-haired gentleman wearing a light tweed topcoat, and said, "Ben, I'd like you to meet my father."

We shook hands, and Mr. Jay said, "I wanted to meet the young man who stroked that magnificent race."

"Thank you, sir," I said.

Lowell said, "Ben's done a fine job all season."

We chatted for a few minutes and Mr. Jay said I should have to come out to Weston sometime for Sunday dinner.

I said, "I'd like to very much."

When we got back in the boat, it was dusky and cool enough to put on sweat shirts. We rowed to the boathouse in one piece, and toward the end of it I worked the stroke up to 32. One of the things I liked best was bringing a good crew home fast, with the power on and the stroke up, hot-rodding it, and this bunch was the best I'd ever ridden with, so I began to drive with my legs on each pull-through, to get my hands away a little faster on each recovery, and to make each catch harder and quicker. Behind me they felt what I was doing, and the timing sharpened and the run lengthened and Hayes said, "You're looking sharp," so that I felt very smooth and sure and strong and I didn't want it to end. For a moment I thought about Ann with her long legs and Staples with his school blazers and club ties and white-haired Mr. Jay and Sunday dinner in Weston, but none of that seemed to matter much, because the power was on and the crew was really swinging and I could lose myself in the rhythm of it.

Finally Hayes called, "Way 'n'uff. Run it out," and we let the shell run with our oars feathered over the water. My breathing and the rush of water hissing past the hull were the only sounds, then the port oars slipped over the edge of the dock and the managers grabbed them and dragged us to a stop. The boat dipped to starboard, I flipped open the catch on my oarlock and Hayes said, "Port out, starboard hold."