Caius Boat Club enjoyed a highly successful return of May Bumps for the first time since 2019, with M1 retaining Head of the River, and W2 and W3 claiming blades.

May Bumps returned for the first time in three years following the Covid-19 pandemic postponement in 2020 and the May Eights Regatta which was held in 2021.

Caius fielded five women’s crews for the first time, racing strongly throughout the divisions. W1 moved from fourth to second behind Newnham, who, like Caius’ top men’s crew, maintained their status at the top of Division One.

M1 – racing in the newly-named Martin Wade – comfortably retained the headship, holding off Lady Margaret (the St John’s Boat Club), who hold the headship in Lent Bumps.

W2 achieved blades by bumping Corpus Christi W1, Downing W2, Robinson W1 and Wolfson W1 in an impressive performance, while W3 also claimed blades despite crashing on Wednesday’s opening day, mounting the bank after bumping Clare W3. Bumps of Christ’s W2, Clare Hall W1 and Darwin W2, saw W3 climb from Division Four to Division Three.

W4 maintained their position in Division Four after one bump across the week, while W5 were bumped twice to slip to the foot of the standings after qualifying through the Getting-on Race.

M2 bumped Girton, Churchill and Wolfson before rowing over on Saturday’s fourth and final day. M3 began by being bumped by Hughes Hall M2, but responded by bumping Pembroke M3 and, on day four, Queens’ M3 to move up a division to Division Three.

Full results are on the Cambridge University Combined Boat Clubs website – men’s and women’s divisions.

W2, left, and W3, right, after bumping on Wednesday and Thursday, respectively (photos: CBC).

Main image: M1 rowing over on Thursday.

Caius Boat Club crews: 

W1: Cox – Milan Hirji, Michelle Crees, Emma Radford, Bronya Sykes, Vera Kunz, Charley Craig, Carys Earl, Georgina Acott, Pippa Morris

W2: Cox – Kirsten Oag, Megan Peters, Abigail Burn, Olivia Conway, Abigail Gilbart-Smith, Lucy Havard, Mila Marcheva, Margaux Riley, Ellis Kelly

W3: Cox – Netra Gupta, Olivia Gray, Holly Goodrick, Rowena Field, Heqing Huang, Ally Claessens, Sophie Barnett, Hermione Peart, Grace Yin Shum

W4: Cox - Miriam Yiqiong, Saffron Covill, Layo Akinola, Camille Saunders, Anna Farrow, Anbei Peng, Tara Hickey-Alton, Amy Clark, Livia Eva Karoui

W5: Cox - Aleks Bura, Grace Malyan, Katherine Elbro, Phillippa Johnson, Eichen Cai, Elizabeth Bratton, Chloe Gibson/Hannah Williams/Liz Addis, Grace Jones, Freya Eastwood

M1: Cox: Benjamin Carter, Joe Nash, George Hawkswell, Cameron Mackenzie, Reef Boericke, Dan Toy, Jack Campbell, Matt Francis, Luke Andrews

M2: Cox: Daphne Argyropoulos, Inigo Holman, Aleksandr Bowkis, Ed O’Connor, Gavin Shields, Toko Avaliani, Alex Lapsley, Ewan Gribbin, Harry Harland

M3: Cox: Ellie Nanni, Benjamin Boys, Alixander Khan, Harry Langford, Ben Burgess, Javier Sanchez-Bonilla, Ben Kelly, Ethan St Catherine, Tomasz Kinowski (Ben Boys and Tomasz were replaced by Isaac Unger and Chung Chan on the final day due to illness and injury.)