It is the day of Town and Gown 2k15 (well, 10k-15 to be accurate), and an early start. I awoke at 1.45 AM, less than an hour after I had gone to sleep, reading my alarm-clock as 7.45AM. Misleadingly refreshed from my rather effective power nap, my usual nocturnal lifestyle failed to acknowledge that it isn’t pitch black at 7.45am. Two days earlier my sister had instructed me to ‘carb-load’, a technique which she said was supported not by her Biomedical Science degree, but by knowledge obtained from her GCSE PE Double award. I hence decided to down a bottle of Lucozade- raspberry flavoured- which catalysed a sugar rush that I’d regret when it woke me up four hours later.

At 8.00AM, after a night of intermittent sleep, I managed to force myself up, renouncing the thought that whilst going the whole 9 yards may be a lot of effort, running the whole 10936 yards of the 10 kilometers was probably going to be too. For breakfast, I discovered I only had bread crusts- a tragedy. My only option was pilfering. They say theft tarnishes a man, but I think it also tarnished said bread, because the stolen white slices, failed to live up to the goodness of my usual seeded wholemeal. Even a cup of peppermint tea couldn’t redeem such a meal- it was a middle class nightmare of undue proportions. I left a note of apology to my flatmate, informing them that they could help themselves to ‘any amount of my milk that they wanted’, signing off with ‘#thatsoundsweird’. If you can’t cross, and subvert communication platforms at 8.32AM on a Sunday morning with a handwritten hashtag, I don’t know when you can.

Before leaving, I managed to salvage one safety pin from a draw to secure my race number, and for the vital second one, was left only with the option of a black and white badge of Kurt Cobain’s face. It is times like this that I chastise myself for trying to be so edgy. Using seamstress skills, gained from my 100% homemade fancy dress record at bops, I took the route of stapling my number to myself instead. If that wasn’t ingenuity I don’t know what is. Forget the wheel, or even the bendy bus, this was true resourcefulness.

By 9.55AM, I had started bonding with fellow runners at the start line, befriending a middle-aged man, who stated he ‘just wanted to finish’. I questioned the truth in this, given his anticipation to press his expensive sports watch as we neared 10AM. I concluded however that humility is customary in such settings, especially when faced with a girl whose number is held on by staples. We waited in anticipation for the start, entertained by the visual fall out of Keble Ball which had happened the night before. Nothing is more amusing than seeing people who thought they could get away with a cheeky walk of shame, being met with 4000 runners as they creep out of Keble lodge. One girl’s ‘statement dress’, was presumably great for a dramatic entrance the previous night, but from the sheepish look on her face, she definitely hadn’t intended for it to be seen by thousands of fun-runners the next morning.  

At 10AM we began, and I took the ‘wise’ decision to find someone to appoint as my pace-keeper. Two muscly rugby players fitted the bill for a period of time, until I had to concede that my desire to run a good time was more important than my subconscious desire to objectify attractive men. By the 4km water station I was doing well, and although I managed to drench myself with water, I reasoned I was mostly seeking the thrill of throwing the cup to the pavement like a marathon runner anyway. The feeling of superiority you get through being able to litter in a park without fear of penalty, or dented morality, is frankly exhilarating.

I managed to finish the race in a good time, and post-race I was left on a high. I’m not sure whether it was the endorphins or the champagne from the Principal’s brunch, but I felt amazing. Considering bets were being had on whether I would a) vomit, or b) cry, and that I had received six text messages asking if I had in fact managed to get up in time, I felt that the race really was a success. Compared to the stress of essay writing, and wrestling over confined books in the SSL (largely in a metaphorical sense, but not always), putting one foot in front of the other was quite simple. I challenge anyone to give it a go next year, or at least sponsor such a good cause.

Halfway through this year’s five-a-side season, it’s easy to remember why it is so loved. It’s college football stripped to the core; any pretence which may have been established in the regular season, any tentative attempts to adopt a ‘strategy’ or ‘game plan’ is utterly blown away by the chaotic mediocrity of teams composed of players normally languishing on the bench of their college thirds.

Group 11 has already emerged as a powerhouse of talent, with Lincoln firsts and Worcester seconds tied for fi rst position and offering the possibility of a tantalising decider. The honour of the most impressive loss undoubtedly goes to captain Michael Bentham’s 11-0 defeat as head of Hertford seconds, which comes in at an impressive goal conceded every 54 seconds.

Hertford overall has had a “very mixed bag” according to captain of the first team, Alexander McAleavy, with a roughly equal mix of wins and losses across all of their teams and mid-table locations in their respective divisions. Hertford right back Toby Chelton has returned from a frustrating Hilary plagued with injury to become the college top scorer, making up somewhat for what is conceivably a porous Hertford back line.

The condensed nature of five-a-side makes for lots of these small success stories. Captain Mark Hattersley of the Merton seconds particularly praised James Zhou, who was expertly scouted as he walked to the gym after the team found themselves in need of an extra player last minute. Despite never playing before, and with the Guardiola-esque tactical advice of ‘go up front and everyone else defend,’ Zhou managed to score a late screamer to steal victory from a dogged St Antony’s side. Group 6 has emerged as one of the most balanced divisions, Merton seconds, St Antony, Oriel seconds and Pembroke thirds all thoroughly in contention, with the only true weak link invariably Wadham seconds, who according to captain Ben Zaranko are keeping up with the proud tradition of “losing every match where the other team have bothered to turn up”.

In contrast, Wadham 1Bs and St Catz seconds are separated by a single point at the top of Group 4, chased by a Univ thirds team steadily gaining momentum. Both teams have managed to achieve the rare five-a-side feat of defensive solidity and attacking intent, similar to this season’s most impressive team, St Catz firsts. Sitting at the summit of Group 3 with a goal difference of +20, it is difficult to see second place Wadham 1As finding a way past Peter Woods’ side.

St Hugh’s captain Christopher Putman, despite beating Univ seconds 4-1 and drawing 1-1 with New seconds and Wadham 1A, came up thoroughly short against Woods’ experienced squad, losing a potentially pivotal game 3-0. Blaming the ‘long trek from St Hugh’s down Iffley, which played havoc with our fitness levels’, St Hugh’s has made a positive if inconsistent start to the season, with all three teams well placed but not exactly blowing the opposition away.

While it might be a stretch to say that this year’s season has been of a high standard, with 85 teams playing across 12 groups, it is fair to say that the unique allure of summer football has not been lost. With very few clear leaders, the only thing we can definitely look forward to in the last half of the season is even more of the defensive howlers, last minute winners and hastily cobbled together teams playing games with double-digit scorelines. 

Two weeks on from the London Mara­thon, Sunday 10th May was Oxford’s turn to capitalise on the running bug. Nearly 4,000 runners took to the streets for the Town and Gown 10k through the city centre, many more lining the streets to cheer on their friends, family and fellow students.

Starting outside Keble, runners got to en­joy a tour of the city’s most historic sites on traffic-free roads, looping round to Magdalen and back up to St Giles via Cornmarket Street, before finishing in the University Parks. At not quite a half marathon, it’s a challenging but far from overly gruelling trial for most runners, with costumes abounding.

Miles Unterreiner put in the fastest time of the day, with a highly impressive 31:23, a minute in front of his closest rival. Having taken BUCS 10k silver last week, Unterreiner seems to be enjoying an excellent run of form at the moment.

The first woman home was Sophie Carter, of Belgrave AC, who took her third victory in this race in the last five years, clocking in at 36:32.

Much as with the London Marathon, to look only at the frontrunners is to misjudge the nature of the event.

In fact, the race is organised by the char­ity Muscular Dystrophy UK, with all profits going to the charity which helps those with a variety of muscle-wasting conditions. The most common, Duchenne Muscular Dys­trophy, affects only males and has no cure, with a life expectancy for sufferers of around 20 years. From only this event last year, the charity managed to raise an incredible £155k, and, although final figures are not in, they hope to improve on this figure from this year’s event considerably given the surge in turn-out.

The race was started at 10am by the char­ity’s patron, author Christine Hamilton. There was also a junior 3km run beforehand. The youth event was not without incident though, after it had to be restarted after about ten minutes when the supporting motorcade took a wrong turn.

For the main event there was a late surge of interest as students and Oxford residents rushed to register on the morning of the race. One race organiser suggested to Cher­well that over 700 runners had registered on the day of the race itself.

A huge amount of credit is due to all finish­ers, both for raising funds and the training along the way. Following a record Oxford turnout at the London Marathon, it looks very much as though the Dark Blue momen­tum continues.

When I finally decided to hang up my life jacket, five years ago now, I thought that it was for good. Oh buoy, how could I have been so wrong? When the call came in for any able-bodied volunteers, willing to take to the high seas (reservoir), in a desperate bid to defend our college’s pride and naval territories in this year’s sailing cuppers, I knew the time had come. As my old kit no longer fitted me, I donned my dad’s old life jacket, which had a retro and ‘hip’ (so I am told) style to it; it wouldn’t look amiss in Cellar. But in all seriousness, I did learn during the day that for yearly ‘initiations’, the Oxford Sailing Club goes out to Park End in their wetsuits and buoyancy aids.

So, early on Saturday 2nd May, we caught a bus over to Farmoor reservoir, a relatively large basin of water, split in two by a sizeable concrete wall. Whilst being initially confused as to why the reservoir had been divided in two, we wouldn’t have to wait long before our question was answered. As we stood in the clubhouse, staring at the great wall with confusion, we were called over to a dark corner of the bar by an old and mysterious man who we hadn’t noticed before.

“Beware ye who take to the waters on Farmoor reservoir. Beware ye of the killer shrimp! The only person to have encountered the killer shrimp and lived to tell the tale is old Mr MacPherson over there.”

But when we attempted ask this man more about his unfortunate encounter, we were met by screams of sheer terror.

Despite the warnings, we had come to sail and sail we would do. From the start, we knew we would be up against it, with only one of our team of four being an experienced regular Blues sailor. For Sailing Cuppers, as for regular training and inter-university competitions at the club, we were sailing the two-man Firefly dinghies. The Firefly has two sails, the mainsail and the jib, the smaller sail at the bow. Whilst the crew trims the jib and assists in ‘hiking out’, the helmsman steers the boat and controls the mainsail. In the morning, the group stages took place, in which we had eight races, which would decide which of the leagues we would start in for the afternoon’s racing, either bronze, silver or gold.

The short course made for some very close and exciting racing. Before the starting gun goes off, a three minute warning is given, during which time each boat strategically tries to determine if one end of the start line is favourable, and also time their approach to the line.

After a slow start, it was clear that my sailing prowess had gone somewhat rusty. The first leg of the course was up-wind, so you had to sail in a zig-zag pattern up towards the mark. After rounding the mark, there was a short reach (across the wind) to the second mark, followed by a long run (with the wind) down towards the bottom mark, then across to the last mark and up to the finish line.

Although we may not have fared too well according to the results, we brave few were definitely able to draw some personal satisfaction from not having capsized and avoiding an ugly death at the antennae of the killer shrimp.
After a fierce battle in the bronze league, we managed to scrape a respectable result with a nail-biting, yet very amateurish, finish to our last race.

But that’s enough about the minnows; in the Gold league some very strong boats from Lincoln (whose sailing stash was the envy of all the sailors there) and Brasenose battled it out for the coveted title of sailing cuppers champion. In the end, it was all smooth sailing for Brasenose, sinking their rivals and cruising to victory.