Any emotion he may feel is kept well under control, save for an occasional sharp word to a bungling manager, or a blast of choice invective to some motorboat jockey who wanders out on the course just before starting time, kicking up waves in the path of the crews.

The pre-race warmup usually involves some three to four miles of leisurely rowing to loosen up the muscles. It is a delicate process, for the men must reach the starting-line just at the point when they are thoroughly warmed up, and yet not fatigued. And they must time it to get there just before the race begins, so they won't cool off again.

Butterfiles, Breads, Brew

The few minutes before the start is the agonizing time of butterflies in the stomach for oarsmen, a time when most of them regret the foolish impulse that over made them go out for crew in the first place. They think of their roommates lolling on the riverbank miles upstream, with a case of beer on one side and a girl on the other. They think of those newspaper reports about how hot the other crews are this year, and they wonder about those rumors or nine-minute time trials.

It takes several minutes to back all the shells up to the stakeboats (anchored rowboats containing a man who holds the stern of the shell until the start) and once this is accomplished there is more delay while the crewmen pool off their sweaters.

The shells leap away from the stake boats at 40 strokes a minute for the first few hundred yards, and then settle into a longer, lower pace for the long pull through the middle of the race. Here the first variation in strategy appears, as the different strokes set the beat. Bill Curwen, for instance, never takes more than 10 sprinting strokes at the start, and then drops the beat all the way down to 31 for the rest of the race.

Penn, last Saturday, stroked high for almost twice as long, and then gradually tapered off to a 32. Every crew has its own pattern.

Once the shell has settled at its regular pace, the main problem is for every man to concentrate on form, power, and timing. The coxswain maintains the latter rudder handles, saving his voice to tell the stroke what beat he is setting and where his boast stands in relation to the opposition.

But the stroke does not go up or down on the basis of relative position, because a crew rows against the clock until the final half-mile. Bill Curwen, for instance, would never vary more than one stroke from his usual 31 unless his rivals were hull down over the horizon. Months of experimenting have proved that a Harvard crew works best at that rate.

Last Two Tense Minutes

It is not until the last two minutes that the stroke oar alters his stopwatch planning to fit the situation. Then, if he is behind, he stakes everything on a final sprint to the finish. This is the most crucial and exciting part of the race, for the oarsmen are already dead tired, and a higher stroke increases the chance of a mistake.

That is why, in the three races so far this year, the Crimson has ignored the convention of sprinting when they are comfortably in the load. Were they to be pressed, however, the boat would go up to 40 for the final minute, and it is at such times that a crew's ability is really put to the test. It is only the instinctive ability to row well that can put a man through such a test.

Does all this answer the question of why Harvard has great crews? Certainly Coach Bolles' technique and ability had a tremendous amount to do with it. Certainly the presence of an excellent river and the best of equipment is a contributing cause. Perhaps Harvard's reputation as a rowing college helps to perpetuate the string of fine oarsmen that come here.

Crew is a Family Sport

The composition of Harvard's student body also must make a difference, for crewmen are almost all drawn from the ranks of prep school alumni, to whom rowing is a respected and honorable sport, often rich with family tradition.

But beyond all this is the indefinable quality o morale and esprit which Coach Bolles feels is the most important cause of all. It is an esprit which can only come from eight oarsmen, a cox, and a coach who are dogged enough to spend months in the cold wind or broiling sun learning to pull a 12-foot oar through the water with the precision and power to win races on perhaps five Saturday afternoons in a year and to pull just as hard despite the fact that 99 out of 100 people who watch them don't even know their names.