The Boat Race is an annual contest between two rowing crews from Oxford and Cambridge universities. The Race takes place close to Easter each year on the River Thames in West London between Putney and Mortlake. First raced in 1829 and 1927 respectively, The Cancer Research UK Boat Races are amongst the oldest sporting events in the world.  March 2016 will see the running of the 162nd Boat Race and 71st Women's Boat Race, both now taking place on the Championship Course.

Watched by thousands along the banks of the Tideway, between Putney and Mortlake in London, and by millions more on TV around the world, The Cancer Research UK Boat Races are a unique sporting event. With four very strong squads of athletes, expect to see more thrilling contests once again this year. 

The race came about because two friends from Harrow School, Charles Wordsworth (nephew of the poet William Wordsworth), of Christ Church College, Oxford, and Charles Merrivale of St. John’s, Cambridge, met during the vacation in Cambridge, where Wordsworth’s father was master of Trinity. 

Wordsworth went rowing on the Cam, and the two school fellows decided to set up a challenge. On February 10, 1829 a meeting of CUBC requested Mr Snow of St John’s to write immediately to Mr Staniforth of Christ Church stating ‘that the University of Cambridge hereby challenge the University of Oxford to row a match at or near London, each in an eight-oared boat during the ensuing Easter vacation.’
Staniforth and Snow had been schoolfellows and boating comrades at Eton.

Since 1829 and 1927, while the essentials have remained the same, rowing races between crews from Oxford & Cambridge universities, much has changed in the Boat Races: crews have become bigger, times are faster, the technology of boats and oars has altered, training methods have become more scientific, even the course is different.

The advent of sponsorship in 2010 by Newton Investment Management has allowed both clubs to invest in coaching and equipment, after having struggled with inadequate facilities for many years. With assurance of a stronger financial future, Cambridge have committed to building a shared facility at Ely, while at Oxford the clubs have shared the Fleming Boathouse in Wallingford since 2009.

With the women's race moving to the Tideway in London in 2015, to be televised for the first time alongside the The Boat Race, the clubs built new coaching teams in preparation for the landmark change.