The Royal St. John’s Regatta: Tradition or discrimination
For an event with a Royal designation, something about the Royal St. John’s Regatta just ain’t right.
North America’s oldest sporting event perpetuates gender inequality through its rules, regulations, and equipment. This sometimes goes unnoticed, even to long-time participants, because inequalities at the Regatta are masked by an old cliché – tradition.
Perhaps it is without intention to harm or any ill-will, but the event is rife with oppression, and it is time to change. The value of tradition rests in the ability to pass custom from one generation to the next. However, in the case of the Royal St. John’s Regatta, traditions have been changing since women could enter in 1856.
With over 100 crews on the 2017 schedule, participation has seen a spike in recent years. The most promising is the growth in youth participation, with the addition of the squirt category in 2011.
The issues I am about to address can be fixed for next to nothing – far less than the $125,000 spent to build the new timing tower at the head of Quidi Vidi Lake in 2015.
Justin Trudeau, a self-proclaimed feminist, would support these suggestions for improvement.
Order of the Championship Races
Every year, the 10 fastest crews (five men’s crews and five women’s crews) are rewarded with the opportunity to race for the championship in the evening. Typically, the later races get the better water because the winds die down as the evening progresses.
Less wind means faster times.
To give each gender a fair chance at racing in the calmer water that is characteristic of the latest slot, it would be ideal if the order of men’s and women’s championship alternated yearly. If the men’s championship race is last one year, then the men’s championship race should be first the following year.
This is not how it works. Currently, the women’s championship race is always first, and the men’s championship race is always last, preventing women’s crews from rowing in the calmer water.
To say this is a safety issue is absurd. If wind were such a safety concern to order of races, the morning and daytime races would not alternate between women and men as they currently do.
Furthermore, the Regatta is a weather-dependent holiday. If the winds were high enough to pose a safety concern to anyone, the event would be postponed to the next day.
Finally, in recent years the number of women’s crews far outnumber the number of men’s crews making this category of racing more competitive. If the Committee is looking to increase the number of spectators who stay to the end of the races, putting women last every other year could bolster public interest leading to more dollars being spent lakeside. Order of Time Trials
In July, the time trials are held to seed crews and determine the race order for Regatta Day.
For decades, the time trials schedule reflected the Regatta Day schedule, alternating back and forth between women’s and men’s races. As Time Trials do not require a championship race, the process has traditionally followed an alternating format.
However, that changed last year. In 2016, all men’s races were completed before the first women’s race at time trials. This meant elite women’s crews had to wait until recreational men’s crews finished their time trial before having a turn.
Unhappy about this schedule change, women rowers recognized that change takes time and took solace in knowing the 2017 schedule would be the reverse.
Surely, there would be an equivalent schedule in which all women’s races were completed before the first men’s race the following year. To our dismay, the 2017 schedule again had multiple men’s races before the first women’s race, depriving women’s crews from any advantage offered by the change in the time trials schedule.
Equipment
There is a movement to standardize equipment in fixed-seat row boats to eliminate any advantages (perceived or real) due to seats or footings.
First, standardized seats were introduced and, most recently, standardized footings were permanently installed in all boats.
When rowers had personalized seats, they could add material underneath the seat if they needed to sit higher in the boat. The standardized seats have removed this ability.
To alleviate this problem, adjustable height clips were implemented in time for the start of the 2017 rowing season. In a sudden turn of events, the Royal St. John’s Regatta Committee banned these assistive devices a few days before the first race of the season, stating that only experienced crews had the knowledge to correctly adjust the new height clips.
Should we not endeavour to teach the growing number of youth participants how to row correctly and safely, rather than traditionally?
Eliminating the adjustable height clips is contrary to rowing safety, best practice, and principles of inclusion.
The current default height rule it is a major disadvantage too all crews — except senior men who weigh the boat down enough for the heights to work as they should.
In a world where accessibility is increasingly important, this is an inequitable action upheld and enforced by a patriarchal, non-transparent organization.
Oar heights are not the only piece of equipment that favours men’s crews. Some of the footings do not have enough holes in them meaning they cannot be moved close enough to the seats for shorter athletes to row properly.
Course names and distances
The other day, my friend’s eight-year old daughter asked her Mom why the female race course was a different length than the male race course. Striving to instill values of gender equality in her daughter, my friend struggled to find a satisfactory answer.
This is because there is no satisfactory answer. Currently, men race 2.45K, and women race 1.225K. In an ideal world, crews of either gender would be able to enter the shorter or longer distance.
In the Olympics, the standard rowing race course for men and women alike is 2000 metres. Clearly the sport of rowing does not have to be this way, so why are we (the women of Quidi Vidi) restricted to racing just over a kilometre?
It is not an issue of strength or stamina. Athletes set targets for themselves and train to achieve those targets. Women could post some impressive times over 2.45K if given the opportunity.
Just how fast, we don’t know. Female rowers in St. John’s cannot even set that target for themselves because they are not permitted to enter the longer race.
This makes me want to do something like Katrine Switzer did in 1967, when she thwarted officials of the all-male Boston Marathon by entering using only her initials. She went on to be the first woman to complete the event and, in doing so, became a women’s rights champion.
Now, thousands of women compete the Boston Marathon every year.
To make matters worse, folks refer to short course as the ladies’ course, as if us dainty ladies should never attempt to race so many grueling metres.
You rarely hear people calling the 2.45K course the gentleman’s course (the binary equivalent of ladies’) ... that just sounds silly! More often than not, people say men’s course and ladies’ course.
Other sports, like swimming, group their races into categories such as short course and long course depending on the length of the pool. Doesn’t that sound nice?
Not to be lost in semantics, my key point here is that participants in the Royal St. John’s Regatta should have the option to compete in either distance — the women should be able to enter the short or long course, as should the men.
Lounging on the sofa of tradition creates an exclusive atmosphere in which squirts, midgets, juveniles, and women’s crews are disadvantaged.
Gender is just one aspect of oppression at the Regatta. With the binary categories of ladies and men, what will the committee do when a transgender or queer person wants to row?
Decisions about standardized equipment seem to have been made unilaterally by the Regatta Committee without request for rower input and have compromised safety, inclusion, and effectiveness of all rowers.
Refusing to act on feedback from those involved with the sport daily has resulted in injury and discomfort. The Regatta Committee is inaccessible, unavailable and unwilling to meet with crews to discuss issues in a collaborative fashion.
The Committee has invited representation from the Royal family to the 200th Regatta. I hope they send Kate Middleton, at this point she would be easier to score a meeting with than the Royal St. John’s Regatta Committee.
Amanda Hancock started rowing on Quidi Vidi Lake when she was 14. She has won six Royal St. John’s Regatta championships, is a member of the 2003 women’s (short) course record-holding crew, and is training hard to set a new record by 2018. Rowing has taken her around the world and introduced her to friends and mentors who have been important and influential in her life. Amanda proudly advocates for equality and inclusion in sport.
Every year, the 10 fastest crews (five men’s crews and five women’s crews) are rewarded with the opportunity to race for the championship in the evening. Typically, the later races get the better water because the winds die down as the evening progresses. Less wind means faster times. To give each gender a fair chance at racing in the calmer water that is characteristic of the latest slot, it would be ideal if the order of men’s and women’s championship alternated yearly. If the men’s championship race is last one year, then the men’s championship race should be first the following year. This is not how it works. Currently, the women’s championship race is always first, and the men’s championship race is always last, preventing women’s crews from rowing in the calmer water.