A foot-ball squabble stopped all athletic con tests between Yale and Harvard, and broke up their boat race for i896; Harvard at once entered into a two-year agreement to row with Cornell at Poughkeepsie. Yale had no race, and rather than acknowledge that the quarrel was really of moment, they entered for the Grand Challenge, where they could do no less than Cornell had done, and might have a chance to win much honor.
The record of Yale at Henley was somewhat better than that of Cornell. Cook coached the crew, and on account of his previous visit to England to learn the principles of rowing, the entry of Yale excited much interest among the English oarsmen, who expected to see their own stroke coming from abroad. But their comments were not favorable, and all thought that Yale was rowing more like Cor nell than any English crew, and that the legs and arms were of more prominence than the backs. The crew was a fairly fast one, but they, like Cornell, took quarters in the low Thames valley near the river, and by the race time some of the oarsmen were considerably off condition and had not their accustomed endur ance, and at the same time the eight was made up rather heavily for a spurting race.
After watching the English crews for a time, Cook saw what he believed to be faults in the Yale style and made the very grave mistake of trying to change the methods in the last few weeks, and also experimented with English oars, taking the whimsical view, held by many at the time, that the dead water of the Henley course requires a narrow blade. These changes, made when all the energy should have been devoted to whipping the eight into the perfection of the style that they had been taught, could not but shake the crew, and they went into the race scarcely knowing what style they were rowing.
Yale, like Cornell, drew Leander for the first heat, and it was a very good Leander eight that the club had put out under the captaincy of Guy Nickalls, who had selected Harcourt Gold, the famous Oxford stroke, for the critical seat. Yale made a hard fight to Fawley Court, but then, like Cornell, they began to give out, and Leander took a slight lead which they did not attempt to increase. The Yale men, though several were nearly out, rowed sturdily, and finished a couple of lengths behind Leander, who rowed in 7.14. Leander won the cup eventually.
Yale sent a powerful and what should have been a fast eight to Henley, barring rather too much weight ; but the eleventh-hour changes of Cook and a lax training took away all chance of winning.'
And now begins the era in our strokes which may be called the English period, and during which time the English principles were more in force than at any previous season ; the influence remained for several years and undoubtedly exercised a most beneficial effect upon our rowing, although, like all ideas in rowing that win, it was carried to a point of absurdity. Court ney of Cornell came home with an entirely new notion of rowing and at once proceeded to make changes in the stroke of the Cornell crews ; the short pump-handle stroke that had no swing was put by, and he evolved a stroke that resembled in some respects the style that then obtained on the other side of the water, just as Cook had made his improvisions back in the seventies. Courtney brought in a long reach and a very hard catch that nearly resulted in a jerk at the beginning ; the slide was cut down to seventeen inches, and the finish was well back. It was a remarkable change from the stroke of the previous years, and the rate reduced from the forties to thirty-four and thirty-six and lower.
Harvard joined Cornell, Pennsylvania, and Columbia at Poughkeepsie. G. S. Mumford, an oar of the previous decade, coached Harvard, and Pennsylvania had Ellis Ward, the rowing advisers not having taken to the methods of Woodruff. Columbia had seven of the winning boat of the previous year and were again partly in the charge of Dr. Walter Peet.
Cornell, with the new stroke set by little Briggs, who weighed less than one hundred and forty pounds, won the University race in the third mile and made the four miles faster than it had yet been done in competition on any course, — r9.29. The timers, however, had become confused, and there is no certainty that this time is correct ; most of the unofficial watches made it much slower. Harvard and Pennsylvania disputed Cornell for a mile, then Pennsylvania fell behind a little, and Harvard fought with Cornell until the second mile, when Cornell threw them off and entered the third mile a certain winner, with Harvard, in very bad condition and closely pressed by Pennsylvania, who were in the wash of the leaders. Cornell won by three lengths from Harvard, and they had a length of open water on Pennsylvania. Columbia's beefy eight was nearly half a mile back. The Freshman race finished in the same order, having been rowed some days before, but it was a stiff contest between Cornell, Harvard, and Pennsylvania.