I'm a rower and this is a blog about sport and the coverage of sport, so it would be remiss of me not to write about the Boat Race. Or, to be precise, the Cancer Research Boat Races.

Tomorrow (Easter Sunday, 27 March) is the second year in which both the men and women of Oxford and Cambridge Universities race each other on the Tideway. Last year's inaugural women's Tideway Boat Race was something quite special. It really shouldn't have been - there has been a women's boat race since 1927, the same year in which women first raced the Championship course on the Tideway in eights. But to me it felt like 2011 was the beginning of the change. In that year a certain Natalie Redgrave, daughter of legendary Olympian Sir Steve, won her Boat Race in the 4-seat of the Oxford blue boat. Because she was a Redgrave there were, remarkably, pictures of the Henley boat races all over the front pages of the mainstream media.

And then in 2013 the chief executive of Newton Asset Management, Helena Morrissey, finally managed to make the change everyone had been wanting for so long. The women's race was to move to the Tideway. It was Morrissey's conviction that the women should have equal funding and equal billing to the men that made the difference after years of campaigning and effort by a lot of women over the years.

Of course there were detractors, when the move was announced. I heard a number of people worry out loud that the women's race would not be as competitive and exciting as the men's race - which really ignores the fact that over the years there have not been that many really close Boat Races. The results list has an awful lot of five-length + winning margins. In 1839 apparently Cambridge won by 35 lengths. And when it came down to it, last year the winning Blue boat margin was 6 1/2 lengths for both the men and women.

Others complained that the women's race would be slower. Well, yes; women are fundamentally not as physically strong as men. That's biology. But also you can't even really compare the winning times of the two crews. The tide speeds up as it comes in, so the men, racing an hour later than the women, are racing on a slightly quicker tide. Does this matter, to the race? Not in my mind.

The other argument was not really related to the women racing at all, but to do with the event itself. There are an awful lot of articles out there decrying the 'privilege' of the rowers, suggesting that they're at Oxford and Cambridge because they're good rowers and not because of their intellectual abilities. The fact the race continues to attract foreign rowers doing an MBA doesn't help the argument. My experience is that actually many Oxbridge tutors really aren't that keen on extra-curricular activities, particularly rowing. Mine certainly wasn't, and I wasn't doing anything like the volume of training that the university squads do. I'm also convinced that every single one of the Blue Boat alumni I've ever met deserved their university place, 100 per cent.

There's also no doubt that while Oxford and Cambridge (men and women) do not always turn out the fastest crews in the country they turn out some of the fastest crews in the country. Cambridge men demolished a German under-23 crew the other week. Oxford had a close battle with Oxford Brookes which Brookes won, before they went on to win the Head of the River last week. On the women's side, Cambridge were fifth at the Women's Head of the River, 1 second behind Brookes and 10 seconds behind a Molesey BC crew they'd beaten a few weeks earlier over a shorter course. Oxford have also beaten Molesey in pre-race fixtures so tomorrow could be very interesting.

Other universities also have their own varsity grudge matches: Glasgow and Edinburgh, Bristol and the University of the West of England, for example. Those should also be celebrated, but frankly they haven't got the weight of history behind them that The Boat Race does. That's why people continue to flock to watch it and why I believe it's a contest that should be continued. It's a great pity that both Oxford and Cambridge still struggle to bring in state school students and they are not the only good universities in this country. But they are among the oldest and best in the world, and I never quite understand why we can't celebrate that fact a bit more. The Boat Race is one of the times when Britain showcases two things we're good at: rowing, and our universities.

Anyway, back to the women. Since the move to the Tideway Cambridge University Women's Boat Club have been training out of my club. They come down on a number of weekends, get used to the Tideway and have a few fixtures against us and other clubs. And they sit in the clubhouse in their breaks, studying. They work hard, both on and off the water, and it's immensely heartening that their effort is now recognised in the same way the men's effort has been for so long and that millions of people now know that the Oxbridge women row too. It's fitting that the peerless British coxless pair of Helen Glover and Heather Stanning are handing out the trophies tomorrow, and I fully expect that some of this year's Cambridge and Oxford squads will be featuring in British boats in the future.

Tomorrow our boathouse will be decorated in Cambridge blue and both the CUWBC Blue Boat and their reserve boat Blondie will walk their beautiful, immaculately-cared for boats out of the boathouse in front of millions of TV spectators for a 20-minute race which they've given their lives up for for the last six months. Next door, the Oxford women will do the same. I hope that they have a fair, close and exciting race.