History
The event was instituted in 1946 for public schools in the United Kingdom. It was opened to entries from overseas in 1964, and that year Washington-Lee High School (USA) became the first overseas crew to win the event.
The inauguration of this race coinciding, as it did, with the first visit to the regatta of Her Royal Highness The Princess Elizabeth (now Her Majesty The Queen), permission was graciously given to name the trophy "The Princess Elizabeth Challenge Cup".
The PE (as it is usually abbreviated) is one of only a few races in the regatta which does not allow composite crews to be entered, and as such each race is a straight competition between one club and another. As the most prestigious race of the schoolboy rowing year, the event attracts strong competition both from the UK and abroad. For British crews, winning the PE can be the final victory needed to win the "treble", a prestigious achievement which comprises winning the Schools' Head of the River Race, The National Schools Regatta and finally the Princess Elizabeth Challenge Cup, all in the same year.
Eton College hold the record for most victories with eleven wins and they also have the record for the most losses in the finals with 5. The King's School Canterbury shares the record with Oundle School for most losses (4) in finals without having ever won the event.
The current record holder for the event is Abingdon School, having completed the course in 6 minutes 19 seconds in the semi-final against Radley College in 2011.
Read more about this topic: Princess Elizabeth Challenge Cup
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“Let us not underrate the value of a fact; it will one day flower in a truth. It is astonishing how few facts of importance are added in a century to the natural history of any animal. The natural history of man himself is still being gradually written.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“The history of every country begins in the heart of a man or a woman.”
—Willa Cather (1876–1947)
“There is a constant in the average American imagination and taste, for which the past must be preserved and celebrated in full-scale authentic copy; a philosophy of immortality as duplication. It dominates the relation with the self, with the past, not infrequently with the present, always with History and, even, with the European tradition.”
—Umberto Eco (b. 1932)