Hudspith delights in revenge win
Twelve months on from the worst moment of his life, Karl Hudspith celebrated one of the best as part of an Oxford crew that beat Cambridge to win the 159th BNY Mellon Boat Race.
It was the perfect way for Hudspith to mark his 25th birthday and to finally bury the pain and bitterness of losing last year's race in controversial fashion. Hudspith was president of the 2012 Oxford crew that had rowed themselves into a strong position when the race was interrupted by a protest swimmer.
Oxford then broke a blade after the restart and Cambridge won but worse was still to come, when Dark Blue bowman Dr Alex Woods collapsed in the boat and was rushed to hospital.
Woods recovered to be part of the victorious Isis crew in Sunday's reserve race. Hudspith and 2013 president Alex Davidson returned to avenge their defeat in the blue boat. Hudspith said: "A year ago I was carrying my friend's body on a stretcher thinking a few moments ago he had died. That was pretty much the worst moment of my life.
"You can sit around in bitterness and anger or put it past you and get back to work. That was a real Boat Race. That was a really epic race. That was the race I have been waiting for these last couple of years. This is a very different feeling."
The official line from Oxford was that revenge was not on the menu but Hudspith and Davidson were not alone in being fuelled by the events of last year. Oxford, who won the toss and opted for the Surrey station, started strongly to open a lead of two-thirds of a length but they could not drop Cambridge.
The Light Blues were on the outside but stayed with Oxford almost all the way around the long Surrey bend.
This time it was they who looked in the strongest position. But just before the river turned into Cambridge's favour, Oxford put in the decisive push to open up clear water and claim the racing line.
"Inevitably (revenge) was in our minds," said Oxford's Constantine Louloudis, who missed the 2012 race to focus on the Olympics. "It was not against any individuals but against what happened last year, wanting to put it right. It was especially the guys who were in both races but also the rest of us who really felt for those guys last year.
"It was a hell of a race. It is fair to say we fancied our chances going into the race but Cambridge made it bloody difficult."
