The Henley Royal Regatta course, give or take a few adjustments, hosted London's Olympic regattas in 1908 and 1948.

And while London's 2012 Olympic racing will take place on Eton's man-made Dorney Lake rather than the River Thames, there is still a distinctly Olympic buzz about this year's Henley, already underway and heading towards Sunday's finals, as crews from all over the world have converged on an event which Sir Steve Redgrave once described as "the nearest rowers every get to racing in a football stadium."

Olympic rowing tickets may have sold out, but the Henley Royal Regatta, an annual event since 1839 other than in times of war, offers the chance of seeing some of the world's top rowers - including all the GB men's Olympic boats - in action on British waters before 2012.

Extra importance has been added to the Regatta this year with many overseas and British crews seeing it as part of their build-up to the World Championships, starting in Slovenia in late August, which doubles as the Olympic qualifying regatta.

Britain's Olympic gold medallists Tom James, racing in the Stewards' Challenge Cup for men's fours, and Andrew Triggs-Hodge and Pete Reed (pictured), competing in the men's pair event, are joining top-flight boats from the United States, Australia and Germany amongst others on the stretch of water that hosted the last home Olympics in 1948.


Those post-war Games saw the host nation finish 12th in the medals table with just three golds. Imagine the outcry if that were to happen next year. The shame. The ignominy. I'm already looking into the possibility of switching nationality in the event of such a catastrophe.

Back in 1948, however, many of Britain's Olympians were content to epitomise the maxim uttered by the founder of the modern Games, Baron Pierre de Coubertin: "The important thing in life is not the victory, but the contest; the essential thing is not to have won but to have fought well."

One of those three rare British golds was secured on this tradition-steeped borderland of Oxfordshire and Berkshire through Bert Bushnell, whose family ran a local boat hire firm, and Richard Burnell (pictured), Oxford Blue and future president of the Leander Club, home to rowing's great and good, not to mention a long stint as The Times rowing correspondent.


This unlikely combination set to in the weeks preceding the Games to secure the double sculls title.

As another generation of Olympians sets to in anticipation of London 2012, Henley will offer the 1,600 rowers involved its own unlikely combination of ancient and modern - a watery Wimbledon, in fact.

The Regatta chairman, Mike Sweeney, has this week described the peculiar fascination that this historic occasion offers.

"Henley is very special and the great thing is the atmosphere on race days", he said.

"The crowds are almost on the end of the rowers' blades along the river bank. It's side-by-side and quite gladiatorial. It's just a tunnel of noise and quite amazing".

It is an atmosphere that the Australian team have not experienced for five years, but they have brought their largest-ever Henley Royal Regatta contingent this year - 43-strong, with most of its Olympic contenders in that number, including include double Olympic champion Drew Ginn, a member of the fabled Oarsome Foursome.

"It's worked out perfectly for us to be able to row here at Henley and then the world cup finals in Lucerne next weekend", said Ray Ebert, the team manager. "It's the first time since 2006 that we've been here and we're really looking forward to it."


Like Wimbledon, which persists, for instance, in running the Gentlemen's Doubles, Henley reveres and cherishes its traditions.

Dress code within the Steward's Enclosure at Henley is famously strict. Only twice has the temperature been deemed sufficiently high to permit the removal of jackets – once in the hot summer of 1976, and again in 2009, although another upward spike of heat might yet see a hat-trick completed this year.

Race commentator John Friend recently tried to explain the Henley position to me, and ended up using the example of the draw. This is conducted in Henley Town Hall and involves small bits of paper which are fished out of the giant silver edifice that is the Grand Challenge Cup – something the GB eight, which races this year as Molesey and Leander and includes the 39-year-old comeback kid Greg Searle, is anxious to get its hands on ahead of Hansa Dortmund, the German crew which narrowly beat them at last year's World Championships.

Yes, the Henley Stewards could certainly conduct the draw electronically. But they prefer a more old fashioned version of digital.

"It's part of our tradition," Friend explained. "It's one of those things you could do differently if you so wished, but it would not be so much fun."

And there you have the Henley Royal Regatta philosophy which, perennially, attracts the finest of Olympians.

Mike Rowbottom, one of Britain's most talented sportswriters, has covered the last five Summer and four Winter Olympics for The Independent. Previously he has worked for the Daily Mail, The Times, The Observer, the Sunday Correspondent and The Guardian. He is now chief feature writer for insidethegames. Rowbottom's Twitter feed can be accessed here.