oarsman wrote:> I have heard this subject wildly debated this week. The regatta is up> there in terms of prestige. It is big enough that our club is sending> two crews from the Boston area to compete, and I know of at least one> other club on the river that is sending a crew.>
One of the big draws of this regatta is that there are events for> juniors, collegiate, open and masters. So, unless someone would like> to challenge me on this, I would contend that this is the largest> sprint race that contains all levels of participants in the US. There> are more important sprint regattas, but they national championships> directed at the individual categories. One might even go as far as> saying that this is the "Head of the Charles" for sprints.>
Hmmm... that might not be too far off the mark, actually. The HOCR is bigger, but I can't think of a 2000m regatta that's bigger than the SDCC, in the USA, anyway. One would THINK that US-Nationals in the summer would be bigger/more important, but it's not. SDCC has a huge draw nation-wide because it's so well run, and it's a chance for recently ice-bound crews to hit some sun and water and get some VERY good racing in.
I would further qualify it by saying it's THE biggest eights-only regatta in the world. Any challengers? Last I checked it was still eights-only (a rule that came about in the early 90's IIRC, because it was getting too big for a 2-day regatta.) There may be one or two exceptions to this rule but I'm not aware of them.
The Royal Canadian Henley regatta is might be bigger, but it allows all boat classes, and is spread across several days.
I'd also say the SDCC is the most prestigious collegiate regatta that doesn't name a "champion" of this-or-that. Copely Cup, Whittier Cup, California Cup, etc. are all perpetual trophies, but they are do not name a national or regional champion of any kind. Due to the draw though, winning at the SDCC is a huge achievement and honor (and a pretty decent shirt-haul...).
