Yale has not lost to Harvard in the annual Varsity 4 miler since their win in 2015, and on Saturday, as a rainy afternoon broke into sunshine just in time for the start of an upstream race from the under the Gold Star Memorial Bridge to Bartlett’s Cove, the Yale varsity eight continued that streak to given themselves and retiring coach Steve Gladstone one more win against the Crimson.
The all-time record of the 156 year old contest still tilts in Harvard’s favor, at 95 wins to Yale’s 59, and there would be no repeat of Yale’s 2022 sweep this year thanks the Harvard 3V.
That crew, which narrowly missed winning the IRA a week ago in a thrilling finish, took the first race of the day, and then the 2V race was tightly contested until Yale broke through Harvard’s 2V in the final half mile of their three-miler, but the varsity race was all Yale despite a persistent chase by Harvard. The Bulldogs eased away early with what Gladstone called a “silky” rhythm and collected a nearly 12 second win: 19:14.9 to Harvard’s 19:26.6.
Yale 2V
Yale and Harvard did not face each other at IRA in the varsity after Harvard missed making the Grand, but their times were close in their successive semis and then in the Grand and Petite Final. Then Gladstone and the crew made a decisive change to the lineup when they got back to Gales Ferry. Fergus Hamilton–the team captain–moved into the stroke seat as Gladstone looked for the best way to give the crew a longer rhythm and the kind of base speed demanded by the four-miler.
Yale, of course, already had a great stroke in Harry Geffen, “a very good stroke” and a “great racer” according Gladstone. Geffen stroked the British U23 eight to gold last summer and Eton to a win in the PE Cup at Henley in 2021, and then at Yale this year had led the crew through both its undefeated regular season and its win at Eastern Sprints. In this final week, though, Gladstone saw a way to get more length and run in the boat with Hamilton in the stern instead of in five, and the crew was on board:
“It was just beautiful, the first time we put them together,” said Gladstone. “Long, easy flow. Just easy-going. Long stroke, no effort and the boat moved out well.”
It is not the first time Hamilton has been popped into the stroke seat; in fact, he moved to stroke between the heat and final at the Eastern Sprints in 2022–which Yale won–when the team was coming back from COVID and dealing with illnesses the week of the race.
“We’ve got a great culture. There are no egos,” Gladstone said about how the crew embraced the change as the lineup switched and Geffen went into the bow seat. “It’s not about them individually. They really care for each other. They want to go fast.”
Yale coxswain Harry Keenan goes airborne
“That Fergus Hamilton line-up was lazy-looking, silky, and they just moved away [in the race]. They had over a length in the first mile,” Gladstone said, agreeing that it looked almost effortless. “That is what you want to see as a coach. They based down the course at 32.”
“It was a wonderful lineup. It was a great day yesterday. I feel very fortunate. I just feel so blessed to have been working with the guys that I have over these years at Yale. They love what they do. They care for each other. And we go fast.”
For their part, Harvard never let up, with their own team captain, Clark Dean, laying down an aggressive 35-36 cadence all the way up the river.
“It’s a very strong team that we’re up against,” said Harvard head coach Charley Butt afterwards, “in terms of in every aspect of good coaching, good athletes, good support from the administration. Every element, but we’re going to show up and do everything we can. We had some good results at the Sprint’s and the IRA and we were determined to follow up on those.”
Those results included a Sprints win by a freshmen-heavy 2V, two of whom–Cameron Beyki and Leo Bessler–then made their way into the varsity to close out the season. Harvard’s final 1V line-up had three freshmen aboard, and Butt credited the mix of experience and youth for the fight he saw in his crews this year.
“We’re really pleased with the team and its momentum,” said Butt. “The senior leadership was outstanding from Clark Dean and other seniors. Last year was a post-COVID year for us, just getting people back into the cycle. Harvard was extremely conservative in their approach to COVID and we feel like we’re reestablishing momentum. Our seniors have really helped us gain momentum, there’s no question, and our freshmen are a vital part of our future.
Harvard 1V
“There were definitely portions of the course, where Yale was able to get crucial advantages on us, but the guys didn’t back down from that and stayed very strong the whole way. We had been working a lot on maintaining a good rhythm and they sustained it so we were able to push and push. It is four miles, and it’s a long go, but for a significant portions of the course, we were right there, doing a very good job.
“It’s all credit to Yale. They’re very good crew and they’re strong. They row a long stroke and they’re good. So what do you do? You just do your best.
“The 2V was not resolved until the last inside of the last half mile,” noted Butt, “and that was as close and as level a race as you’ll find in a side by side context.”
“There’s only been one Olympic champion ever in the regatta itself, and that was last year,” said Butt, referring to Yale 1V veteran Dan Williamson, who raced in the 2V this year as he worked his way back from an injury. “But it was a great challenge [to race against him in the 2V] and the guys were up for taking on one of the world’s best rowers and doing their best and we felt like we did. I was glad that they competed and didn’t back away from that challenge.”
Harvard’s 3V was the crew that keep Yale from sweeping the day:
“The 3V is a crew who were were fourth at the Sprints,” said Butt, “and then they missed winning the IRA by a few tenths of a seconds. So they demonstrated that they’re fast and they’re courageous. Yale, to their credit, were able to respond and to keep the race close, but the guys did a good job of getting control and then when Yale was moving back, they were able to stop them. That’s just the signature of a good race.”
Harvard 3V
156 Years of The Race
Both coaches reflected on the history and meaning of The Race.
“If you’re a Yale or Harvard person, it’s the whole deal,” said Gladstone. “When I came here, I didn’t have an appreciation for it, and I thought it was kind of strange, but being here and having coached here for 13 years, it’s a magnificent event. It’s absolutely unique. For a Yale or Harvard oarsmen, it is ‘it.’
“From time to time, we’d come back from the IRA with a national championship, and still know full well that if we didn’t win this race, there’d be gloom. Perpetual gloom!
“It’s the length of time we spend here. Each team has its own camp, its own buildings. They come up here for a couple of weeks and the pictures in the buildings. It just reminds you of the history of the race. So it is powerful and I sure am happy that we won it this year.”
“The best thing is that this tradition has existed for more than 150 years,” said Butt. “This is the way college athletics got started. It was a bunch of kids from Harvard and from Yale, before the Civil War, who decided they wanted to go compete with each other.
“I feel that this event makes a real statement about what sports should be versus what they’ve become. They’re discussed most often as entertainment and revenue and possibilities for turning a profit but college athletics is education through athletics. And this is the best example of it. These are good students going toe to toe.
“There’s huge value in education through athletics. At the end of his life, Harry Parker, an absolutely ferocious competitor, was remarking on himself as an educator. That, I think, is the most important thing, to maintain this experience of education through sport.
“It’s just my job, as a someone who started very young in the sport and who is now on the older side of the sport, to preserve the tradition. We want to make sure this is happening in 100 years when we’re all gone.”
Gladstone Goes Out Victorious
Gladstone’s final race at Yale goes down as a win, and while the 82 year old will be back in the coaching launch before the end of the month with the US National Team, selecting an eight for this year’s World Championships, Saturday did mark the end of a collegiate coaching career that may never be equalled.
From Gladstone’s first medal-winning crews with the Princeton freshmen heavyweights in 1966 and 1967, to his four undefeated seasons with the Harvard Lights, through his 14 IRA Varsity eight titles with Cal, Brown, Cal again, and finally Yale, he has set a bar for excellence at every program he has led.
Coach Gladstone
Watching his final collegiate crew finish this last season was emotional, he said.
“There’s definitely some sadness and melancholy that this chapter is over,” Gladstone admitted. “I think anybody would feel that, but I’ll get back and get busy, down in Princeton, with the National Team.”
For his part, Gladstone says he has loved his time at Yale as much as the time he spent at Cal and Brown, the three programs he lead the longest.
“I love what I’ve experienced, and we had the same energy at all these places. People who loved what they’re doing, whether they’re in the fourth boat or the varsity boat. Most of them learned to give full measure. Most of them learned not to be self obsessed. And it was great.”
“It’s always the culture,” said Gladstone, when asked about the key to his many successes. “People say, How do you change the culture? And I don’t change the culture. We bring people in who seem to have demonstrated a love for the sport and most of the time, they become the transmitters of the culture.”