Hertford College Boat Club is proud to be a part of Hertford’s inclusive traditions. We try to reflect this inclusive philosophy throughout the club, providing an opportunity to all students to be part of our sport, as well as developing highly competitive college crews. Most of our athletes have learnt to row from scratch at Hertford and for many it becomes a core part of their Oxford experience.

Rowing is not a cheap sport, and we have been extremely fortunate over the years to receive a huge amount of support from our extremely generous alumni. With the tragic passing of our major sponsor Terry Hughes in 2014, however, we lost a significant chunk of financial support that we had come to rely on.

We have taken many measures to save the club money, but HCBC continues to struggle and expenditure is still running ahead of income. Rowing as a sport has become significantly more expensive in recent years – coaching costs have grown (and the number of people willing and able to coach for free has decreased), and costs for racing, including the main Oxford races, have increased greatly. Student rowers pay subscription fees, but at a time when the cost of studying has increased greatly, we can’t raise these too much more without compromising our inclusive ethos. HCBC needs regular gifts of £8,000 a year to ensure that we can continue to offer an inclusive club with good quality equipment and coaching to allow athletes to compete at a high level.

Please consider donating to help rowing at Hertford: you can do so via the Hertford Development Office. This allows us to claim gift aid, so if you are a UK tax payer, please tick the gift aid box as this will increase your donation by 20% at no cost to you.

Online – please click here (under ‘College Life’)
Direct debit via paper form or over the phone Tel: +44(0)1865 279428
Online banking to set up a standing order Hertford’s sort code: 20-65-18 and account: 10491411
Using the reference – DON-surname

I hope that you will want to be involved in the next chapter of Hertford College Boat Club and I look forward to seeing many of you at Summer Eights 25th-28th May to cheer on the crews.

Best wishes,
Rachel Roberts