IN THE colourful tapestry of 174 years of the Boat Race, only one pair of brothers has rowed against each other for the rival universities. In 1900, Tom Etherington-Smith was a member of the Oxford crew while his brother, Raymond, a surgeon, represented Cambridge eight years before he won an Olympic gold medal and 12 years before he died from peritonitis, contracted performing an operation.

There cannot have been too much fraternal mercy in 1900 since Cambridge equalled the course record to win by 20 lengths. Yet as the universities start making their preliminary selections for the 2003 event, there are two pairs of brothers, all from Hampton School, West London, vying for places. James Livingston and Ben Smith are having trials for Cambridge; David Livingston and Matt Smith, the president, for Oxford.

Of the four, Matt Smith is most likely to take part. Now 21, he was one of the youngest people to row in the event when he took part in 2000 and has already been through three years of intensely dramatic races. And he has seen them from their epicentre: the stroke seat.

Winners in 2000, controversial losers in 2001, when the event was restarted after a clash of blades, Oxford triumphed again last March in the first race for 50 years in which the victorious crew came from behind after Barnes Bridge.

Smith has been the common denominator, a stroke weighing little over 12st but with a precision of technique and psychological attitude that makes his lack of weight and power less relevant. The adjectives commonly used about him are “dogged, terrier-like, relentless”. When Sean Bowden, the Oxford coach, was asked more than two years ago why Smith had been selected when so young and so light, he replied: “Because he’s a bloody good oarsman, that’s why. He has hardly lost a race in his life.”

A world junior champion in coxed fours in 1999, he said that he does not really think about previous Boat Races. However, he does recall that defeat in 2001, which rankled Oxford because they were marginally ahead at the time the race was stopped. The loss caused him to stop rowing for a while. “I took some time off to get over it,” he said. Asked whether he thinks often of this year’s epic race, he replied: “It is a great thing to have done, but next year is separate. However, we can take confidence that our preparations worked.”

Oxford were told by Bowden that the event was not so much eight oarsmen against eight but eight against one and the pace, set by Smith, was so intense that Sebastian Mayer — the renowned international oarsman from Germany — in the Cambridge boat was rowed to exhaustion.

Why does the Boat Race still generate such interest? Smith believes that this is partly because the same crews are involved each year and therefore are easy to relate to. “To win is one of the greatest things you can do in the sport; to lose is horrendous,” he said. “To an onlooker it is clear to see what it means to the people involved.”

After graduating at Oxford in biological science, he is now studying for an MSc there in the Science and Medicine of Athletic Performance. This gives him particular insight into the crew’s preparation for the 2003 race, sponsored by Aberdeen Asset Management, which for the first time has been scheduled for a Sunday, on April 6.

He is alert to the requirements of lactate testing to assess the physiological state of the oarsmen and their need to mix protein and carbohydrate at meals to help in their absorption. After their trials earlier this month, the Oxford squad will be going this weekend to Davos for cross-country skiing, useful for aerobic conditioning, just when Cambridge are winding-up training before their trials on the Thames on Thursday.

Smith will be thinking of his 19-year-old brother, a bronze medal-winner in the 2000 Junior World Championships, as Ben strives to get into the Cambridge crew. “We were always pretty close as kids and we speak on the phone regularly,” he said. “When we are at home (in Teddington) we go out to have a few beers together.”

The younger Smith is in his second year reading architecture at Trinity Hall, which he chose because it is a course that Oxford does not offer. Taller at 6ft 4in and heavier at 13st 4lb, he took up rowing after being inspired by the example of his brother. “I would not have started rowing without him, although a lot of my friends were taking up the sport,” he said. The brothers raced against each other in Germany last year. Ben said: “It was a really odd experience. Now we joke all the time at the possibility of being in opposing crews in the Boat Race.”

Their mother, Sarah, said of her sons: “Matt does not give up. Once he has set his mind on something, he will give it his all. Ben is more easy-going and certainly appears more laid-back, but put him in a race situation, then he has the same qualities as his brother.

“It has been very weird, when previously supporting Oxford so strongly, hard even to say the word Cambridge, to have our loyalties split. Now the family are supporting both of them and will remain completely neutral.”

Most observers expect Ben to row for Goldie, the second crew. But how would she and Don, her husband, react if they were opposing each other in the actual Boat Race? She thought for a moment before replying. “We would just have to go to the finish and not watch. We know how seriously our sons both take it.”