Red Blisters

To Londoners, the dock strike was a nagging labor problem. To the visiting Russian rowers, it was a singular embarrassment. They could hardly disapprove of such a proletarian maneuver, but there they stood on the shore with their sweeps in their hands, and there were their shells on the deck of the strikebound Soviet freighter Strelna. The regatta at Henley, where they had swept the river only the year before, was only a week away. How could they practice? They were up the Thames, as it were, with a useless set of paddles.

Soon everybody got into the act--union officials, the Soviet Embassy, Old Blues who had long since switched from crew racing to the Foreign Office--and soon the Russians had their shells. Meanwhile, they practiced in borrowed boats, and they did not like it. Balancing was difficult in the narrower British craft; the slides were shorter. Their buttocks were getting blistered, the Russians complained.

Better Conditioned. For all their troubles, the Krasnoe Znamia crew, Russia's heavyweight eight, did well enough in the first heats of the race for the Grand Challenge Cup. In their borrowed shell, they came home half a length ahead of Jesus College, Cambridge. Next they raced the Vancouver Rowing Club (the University of British Columbia's varsity eight). The Canadians, too, had been delayed by the strike. Moreover, half their crew had come down with nasty skin infections. This was their first race of the regatta.

To everyone's surprise, the Russians found themselves up against a better-conditioned crew. The Canadians not only were sharper at maneuvering on the wind-chopped Thames, but they had more strength left for a last-minute sprint. The Red rowers finished 1 1/4 lengths behind.

Better Form. Whatever happened next, unheralded Vancouver had won a moral victory. The Canadians could hardly have expected to keep up their winning ways when they took on the University of Pennsylvania's crack eight in the finals. Still, they managed to make a race of it. The Quakers had to put all their power into a last-stretch sprint to finish a third of a length in front.

Although they obviously were chagrined to lose that 116-year-old Grand Challenge Cup, the Russians remembered their political protocol--even when they made their last-minute explanations. "Our boats--we think they came too late," said Manager Vladimir Muchmenko. "No, not too late, but late enough. But we would not blame the strikers, only the situation."

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