BOAT RACE

The Boat Race is an annual rowing race between the Oxford

 University Boat Club and the Cambridge University Boat Club,

 rowed between competing eights on the River Thames in

London, United Kingdom. It is also known as the University

 Boat Race and the Oxford and Cambridge Boat Race,

 or by a title that includes the name of its current sponsor

 (from 2013, the BNY Mellon Boat Race). It usually takes

 place on the last Saturday of March or the first

Saturday of April.

The first race was in 1829 and the event has been held annually

since 1856, except during the First and SecondWorld Wars. The

 course covers a 4.2-mile (6.8 km) stretch of the Thames in

 West London, from Putney to Mortlake. Members of both

 teams are traditionally known as blues and each boat as

 a "Blue Boat", with Cambridge in light blue and Oxford dark

blue. As of 2013 Cambridge have won the race 81 times

 and Oxford 77 times, with one dead heat.

The race is a well-established and popular fixture

 in the British sporting calendar. In 2009, some

 270,000 people watched the race live from the

 banks of the river^[1] and in 2011 almost 17.2 million

 viewed the race on television.

Boat race became such a popular phrase that

it was incorporated into Cockneyrhyming slang,

 for "face".^[citation