Rivalry on the water's a family affair

Every Christmas it gets a bit serious. Rick Dunn will stroppily defend the legitimacy of some obscure word that the rest of the family swear he must have made up, while across the board, Andrew Dunn will lead the vehement protests. Vicious game, Scrabble, they nod sagely.

So if they're that competitive in the world of triple word scores, imagine what these two cousins are going to be like when they brandish oars and adopt different shades of blue to row in Saturday's Boat Race.

"It's going to be an an interesting first because we've never actually raced before, eyeball to eyeball," pondered Oxford oarsman Andrew, glancing across for confirmation. "Not eyeball to eyeball. Don't you mean my eyeballs watching the back of your head?" responded Cambridge's Rick.

"Is that what you think? Well, I reckon I'll be seeing a lot more of you than you see of me," came the indignant riposte. By now, you'll get the picture. It's all good-natured stuff, but you can't conceal the feisty family affair which will make for the most intriguing sub-plot of the 148th edition of the race.

Race statisticians reckon two members of the same family rowing against each other is a rare occurrence. Family loyalty to one of the rival universities means that brothers or cousins are more likely to compete on the same crew. In the Dunns' case, it was young Andrew who broke the Cambridge tradition by going off to Lincoln College, Oxford, to study history. "I felt a bit of a traitor at first," he smiles.

The lads' fathers were brothers who both attended the same college at Cambridge a couple of years apart. Rick's father, David, became a rowing legend there when, after winning a half-blue, he coached Light Blues crews for two decades. Andrew's dad, Richard, was a boxing blue.

They both died a few years ago but the boys reckon that with their old competitive nature, which has clearly rubbed off on them, they would have loved to have seen this.

In the light blue corner, there'll be 26-year-old St Edmund's College student Rick, already twice a world champion and now pursuing the Steve Redgrave path to Olympic glory in the British coxless fours. In the dark blue, 22-year-old Andrew, who was actually inspired to pursue the sport because of the exploits of his big cousin.

Their families are very close, and every year Rick's clan would trek down from Cambridge to Andrew's in London for Boat Race weekend. As kids, they watched the event on TV and got hooked. "Never imagined we'd row against each other in it one day, though," Andrew smiled.

He jokes about the old days when he'd cower behind the sofa watching Rick terrorising his younger brother. "He was about twice as big as us - but things have evened themselves out." Too right. They're both 6ft 4in, built like outhouses and look so alike you'd swear they were brothers.

They have both already enjoyed the taste of victory in the race, Andrew in the 2000 edition and Rick last year. Fate, in the shape of injury to Andrew, kept them apart last year, but this time, after a race predicted to be a pretty close affair, one of them is going to experience the sinking feeling for the first time.

"Whatever happens, we'll share a drink on race night," said Rick. "I won't be happy if I've lost - but if there is some silver lining to be found on a massive cloud, it'll be that I'll be so pleased for Andrew."

And what would their dads be thinking? Rick smiled at the thought. "You can bet they'll be both sitting up there proud as punch, saying: 'My son's better than your son'."