# Talk:The Boat Race 1987

BBC Witness
Telegraph
Boat Race Company
True Blue

I've made a few tweaks here and there: feel free to tweak further/revert, etc. A nicely put together article (of course!) which is a dead cert for GA and has enough to it for a stab at FA, I feel. A few minor comments below, by way of an informal PR:
Lead

This is a little thin: is there any way we can enlarge it slightly? The mention of the new sponsor may be something to think of?
I've had a pop at it.  If I think of anything else I'll certainly expand it further. The Rambling Man (talk) 09:08, 10 September 2014 (UTC)
History

"Cambridge went into the race as reigning champions, having won the 1986 race by seven lengths,[5] with Cambridge leading overall": could do with a tweak here, bit of a Cambs/Cambs duplication
Indeed, tweaked. The Rambling Man (talk) 09:08, 10 September 2014 (UTC)
"University of Oxford and the University of Cambridge".  How about saying "the universities of  Oxford and Cambridge to avoid the repetition of "University of"? Cassiantotalk 09:26, 10 September 2014 (UTC)
"The race was sponsored by Beefeater Gin for the first time". Do we know when?  If so, we could word it like this: "The race was sponsored for the first time in **** by Beefeater Gin". Cassiantotalk 09:26, 10 September 2014 (UTC)
Mutiny

I see people have denied it was a mutiny: is this still the COMMONNAME for the events? (if it is, then all is good with the term)
I think it's okay, per COMMONNAME as you suggest. The Rambling Man (talk) 09:08, 10 September 2014 (UTC)
"Following defeat in the previous year's race..." -- Helpful to know what year we are talking about. I appreciate it is the name if the article, but one is liable to get confused seeing as we do mention other years in the previous section. Cassiantotalk 09:26, 10 September 2014 (UTC)
"However": always a bugbear for some at FAC, especially at the start of a sentence. I think you can probably lose it here, just saying "In a fitness test..."
Excised. The Rambling Man (talk) 09:08, 10 September 2014 (UTC)
Race

"indavertantly resulted in avoiding racing in a lightning storm": I think this could be phrased a little more elegantly, but my brain is struggling too much at the moment to come up with something useful!
Tried.... The Rambling Man (talk) 09:08, 10 September 2014 (UTC)
Legacy

"a film based on the book, True Blue was released": Probably needs a bit of a tweak, as this could mean the book is called TB (I know is also is, but you see what I mean!) Possibly "a film of the same name"?
Done something similar, not quite the same name so just piped it. The Rambling Man (talk) 09:08, 10 September 2014 (UTC)
"Four years earlier": is there any merit in starting with Clark, then going on to Topolski, to keep a sense of chronology?
Reordered and reworded accordingly.  The Rambling Man (talk) 09:08, 10 September 2014 (UTC)
Cheers - SchroCat (talk) 10:01, 4 September 2014 (UTC)

Much appreciated.  Once I'm out of work, I'll take a closer look. The Rambling Man (talk) 10:38, 4 September 2014 (UTC)
Cheers again, I'll GAN it and see where we go from there.  The Rambling Man (talk) 09:08, 10 September 2014 (UTC)

Given that this is about (mostly) British rowing, should strokeside/bowside be used rather than port & starboard?TrulyBlue (talk) 15:47, 20 April 2015 (UTC)

I guess I just used what the reliable sources said.  Feel free to amend.  The Rambling Man (talk) 06:29, 21 April 2015 (UTC)

I wonder if given that Colin Moynihan was a sitting Member of Parliament at the time of this race, the Umpire section in the infoxbox should say "Colin Moynihan MP"? Dunarc (talk) 23:37, 4 December 2020 (UTC)

A few records are mentioned, all of which seem to be cited to a single Times article which isn't available online.
The one for oldest rower is obviously outdated post-James Cracknell, but perhaps means "oldest at the time".
However, Guinness World Records says the youngest rower in boat race history was R C Ross in The Boat Race 1977, at 18 years 200 days; I think Matthew Brittin, based on the date of birth his Wikipedia page, would have been about 7 days older.  So I'm wondering if we need to re-examine this source? TSP (talk) 15:15, 1 April 2025 (UTC)