The Alternative Boat Race

The greatest boat race to grace the Thames is arriving in London this April (and some teams from Oxford and Cambridge are up to something too).

Shortly before the BNY Mellon Boat Race gets underway on Sunday 6 April, a new event being held only a short distance from the event’s finish line will see 250 model lifeboats take to the River Thames in a race to raise funds for the RNLI.

This will be the RNLI's first Alternative Boat Race on a stretch of the Thames just a stone’s throw up-river from the official Boat Race finish line. Some 250 model lifeboats will race against each other on the Syon Reach section of the river and rowing clubs from across the UK are being encouraged to sponsor one of the model lifeboats to help raise funds for the charity and their own club.

The winner of the race will win the RNLI Alternative Boat Race trophy while the rowing club that raises the most money will win a master class with World Rowing Championship bronze medallist, Adam Freeman-Pask. An exciting new addition to Boat Race day, the event will be preceded by a celebrity row in a 100-year-old wooden lifeboat.