Photos NAOMI BAKER
HENLEY ROYAL REGATTA 2016
Every Henley-goer knows that the Royal Regatta is stuck in a time warp, that it has hardly changed since the Grand Challenge Cup was first contested in 1839. Over the next 40 years rowers wrestled control of the regatta from the town worthies who started it. Royal assent was granted by Prince Albert in 1851, and the event morphed into a kind of Edwardian garden party it resembles today. The Stewards set the rules of engagement at a time when there was no such thing as a governing body of rowing, nationally or internationally.