F is for Food

A healthy, balanced diet is essential to maintaining performance and aiding recovery for any athlete. Rowers may also be paying close attention to what they eat to meet weight category restrictions for competition. But it's not just the athletes who are thinking about food. Ask anyone attending a regatta or chewing the fat in the club room - the scran on offer is a key part of the rowing experience, whether you're competing or not. The home bakes and bacon rolls at Clydesdale, Clyde's BBQs, or the legendary burgers at Strathclyde Park stick in the memory (and, sadly, the thighs!) in a way that a protein bar can't. 

From the early 1830s to the 1880s, the Glasgow Regatta Club organised the two biggest aquatic galas on the Clyde. The club's social side was always prominent – it held fundraising dinners and suppers in local taverns to celebrate each year's successful races. In the 1850s, celebratory post-regatta dinners were held in Mrs Crawford's Waverley Hotel in George Square, decorated with the winners' pennants. The Trades Club held post-race 'tattie and herring' suppers in 1889 and 'smoking concerts' – which immediately undid the benefits of exercise!  

Before the 1860s, Glasgow's water supply was often polluted, and weak beer was a safer alternative. The campaign against drink was hugely influential in the 1800s, and sports were promoted as a morally uplifting distraction. By 1855, ‘100 members [of the Regatta Club] were connected with the Temperance Society', and sobriety prevented men from drowning. Of course, publicans of both sexes, and the council, made money by licensing alcohol tents erected during boat races. The teetotal activists took court action, but municipal liquor control was too lucrative to lose. Subsequently, 'refreshment rooms' were included underneath temporary private grandstands. The general public consumed 'a host of gingerbread, soda water, apple and nut stalls … at very small prices'.  

Working-class rowers had to spend their money on travelling to competitions, entry fees and equipment. They were far less able to purchase special 'sports nutrition', when feeding their family was their main priority. Details of their intake aren't readily accessible, though urban dwellers might have had poorer food than farm workers. Attempts at serious training diets were of varied scientific worth, for instance vitamins were only identified in the 20th century. Until the 1870s, recommended diets were usually adaptions of those developed by renowned boxing coach Captain Robert Barclay Allardice. They were generally consumed by wealthier rowers, like university students, during prolonged race preparation. 

Suggested beakfasts included boiled mutton or beef ('no grease'), 'with light biscuit or dry toast', egged sherry was an occasional tonic; for evenings, more beef, and tapioca pudding, and milk and tea were permissible. The heavy reliance on carbohydrates, and general exclusion of vegetables, might even have encouraged scurvy, which develops over three months. Despite sweating during training, some trainers discourage 'excess' liquid intake. There was no standard system of training, and each coach or club probably developed their own nutritional practices. It was only at the end of the century that more reliable scientific principles were developed.

We've come a long way since the 1870s in understanding how our bodies work and how to fuel them for optimal performance. The sports nutrition industry was valued at $34.8 billion in 2020 and aggressively promotes products, often wrapped in single-use plastic packaging, to aspiring athletes looking for that 'extra edge'. However, most nutritionists agree that shelling out on expensive supplements and drinks wastes time and money. 'Food-first' is the advice from British Rowing; just don't follow the diet above!