The women’s Boat Race will be held on the same Tideway course and on the same day as the men’s event from 2015, organisers said yesterday.

The women’s race, which first took place in 1927, is currently staged in Henley over a two-kilometre course and holds a relatively low profile compared to the four-and-a-quarter-mile men’s event, which attracts eight million TV viewers and 300,000 to the banks of the Thames.

Boat Race chairman Robert Gillespie confirmed the men and women will race the full course between Putney and Mortlake and start to receive the same financial backing.

The Boat Race also an-nounced a new sponsorship deal with investment management company BNY Mellon.

The BBC have vowed to broadcast the entire women’s race, to ensure complete parity between the two events.

British rower Annabel Vernon said: “Rowing is the ultimate team sport and the Boat Race is the ultimate expression of that.

“This incentive provides a massive opportunity to grow women’s rowing.”

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