A man balanced on a tight rope across Jesus Green and boating crews with greenery in their hair - a typical Cambridge afternoon. The Lent Bumps are rowing races held annually on the River Cam in Cambridge; they began in 1887. At the start, signalled by a cannon, each crew is separated by a distance of about 1½ boat lengths (approximately 30 m or 90 ft). Once the race has begun, a crew must attempt to catch up with the crew ahead of it and bump (physically touch or overtake it) before the crew behind does the same to them. A crew which bumps or is bumped must pull to the side of the river to allow other crews to continue racing. Any crew which bumps then swaps places with the crew that it bumped in the following day's racing and picks foliage from the bank to decorate themselves.. The process is repeated over four days, allowing crews to move up or down in the overall order of boats.
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