Rowing: Pinsent and Cracknell keep Leander in clear

Leander retained their position at the head of the Tideway on Saturday by setting up a decisive 20-second gap on second-placed Molesey.

Entirely made up of current internationals, including the world pairs champions, Matt Pinsent and James Cracknell, Leander led Oxford Brookes, who started behind them in the 420-boat time trial, by nine seconds at Hammersmith Bridge.

They extended their lead by about three boat lengths over the last third of the course to Putney, mindful that the Croatian national crew were among the new entries. Croatia finished sixth, preceded by an Imperial College crew packed with internationals in third, Wiking of Berlin in fourth, and Oxford Brookes in fifth.

Oxford, with the Commonwealth rowing medallists Sarah Waldron and Sarah Martin on board, won the women's Boat Race decisively at Henley yesterday, gaining a third of a length advantage from the start and building on it throughout.

On the Berkshire station, they had a length and three-quarters in hand as the crews passed the halfway mark on the 2,000-metre (1.25-mile) stretch of the Royal Regatta course, and finished double that margin to the good in 6min 35sec.

Oxford also won the women's reserves race and the men's and women's lightweight events, but failed to repeat last year's clean sweep in the Henley Boat Races when Granta, the Cambridge reserve men's lightweight crew, came through Nephthys to secure victory by two and a half lengths after a re-row, caused by a bad clash.