Some of these race lengths were almost gone with wind

The Durham School Boat Club (back) and Cleveland Scholastic Rowing Association compete in youth men's eights. Eton College of England won the event. (Yoon S. Byun/Globe Staff)

Yesterday's brisk northeast wind - 16 miles an hour with gusts up to 30 - didn't require race organizers to go to a shortened course, as they did four years ago.

But rough conditions near the Charles basin, where several singles flipped, made for alterations at the BU starting line and below.

The warm-up area was compressed, with boats kept above the finish line for the collegiate 2,000-meter races.

Had the wind worsened or come around to the dreaded east, officials would have been in a fix, since it would have taken 90 minutes to reset the course.

Busted at the slots
Can the Head of the Charles, which has grown to 57 events, 1,786 boats, and 8,478 competitors, get much larger? Not really.

"We've really run out of slots to add events," said regatta executive director Fred Schoch.

"It's a matter of stretching the volunteers thinner. The Head has become a three-day event because a lot of crews get here Thursday night. We went out to practice at 11 a.m. on Friday and it was jammed."

As it was, 30 percent of applicants were denied entry. Added this year were two charity events, mixed doubles and parent/child doubles.

A yield sign
Acknowledging that "competitive friction is a natural outcome" of Head racing, regatta organizers have changed the interference penalties that frequently blamed faster boats for aggressive passes.

Now, the onus is on the slower boats to yield. "There was a general feeling after evaluating all the appeals and infractions last year that we needed to send the message that slower crews needed to yield sooner," said Schoch. Passers only will be penalized for causing a severe collision (e.g. hull-to-hull, blade-to-hull, blade-to-rower) or pushing a non-yielding boat off the course.

Richard, the eighth
Richard Kendall won his eighth senior veteran singles crown in nine years, outracing familiar rival Christopher Collins by an age-adjusted 24-plus seconds.

"My doctor said that if I was a good boy, I could race," said the 78-year-old Kendall, who was rowing with a partially torn right Achilles' tendon (sustained while cross-country skiing) that he has resisted having surgically repaired. Kendall, who weighs 150 pounds, was more worried about predictions of a stiff headwind that would put him at a disadvantage against younger and heavier rivals. "But Jupiter Pluvius was kind," he said, after he bettered his course record in 20:30.528.

Records fall
Despite the cross-headwind, four more course records were set yesterday, bringing the weekend total to an even dozen. Besides Kendall's mark, Brooke Stevens of the Cambridge BC (23:29.562) broke her record in the women's veteran singles and standards were set in both the youth men's (Thomas Cameron-Pryce Waites, Lake Oswego CR), and women's (Victoria Greco-Kristine O'Brien, St. John the Baptist DHS) doubles events . . . Yesterday's riverside attendance was 138,000, according to a State Police estimate, bringing the weekend total to 255,000.

John Powers can be reached at jpowers@globe.com.