A Centenary of Rowing Regattas— Murray Rowing Association

Appendix 4 - Grand Challenge Four Winners

Winners of the Grand Challenge Race until the event was abandoned in 1930

To win a Challenge, a crew had to win two races. In the early years when there were only a few entries by local Clubs, the race would be run at least twice for a crew to gain the necessary two wins. As the number of entries increased, heats had to be run so a boat naturally had to win both heat and Challenge final to secure the Prize and this constituted the two wins.

After the change to outriggers in the 1920's, the Senior Four became the main race in conformity with the usual amateur programme and the Challenge Fours Race became outmoded and redundant, disappearing after 1930 as a Challenge Race with heats merely duplicated a Senior Fours Race with heats.

Another reason for the waning interest in the Challenge Race was that, without the incentive of financial gain after the assumption of amateur status in 1892, this Challenge Race gradually became meaningless.

At the inception of the Race, although towns are named by the winners, there were no Clubs represented. For example, Chiltern, an older (1858) goldfield than Rutherglen and represented at the first Regatta in 1860 by the winning boat "White Squall", would not have had a Rowing Club. It is obvious that, at first, a boat represented a group of men who had a financial interest in racing their particular boat. It was, only later, presumably in the late 1860's or early 1870's, that the Wahgunyah, Rutherglen, and later still, Corowa Clubs were formed.