Independence Day Regatta: Year Two

It’s amazing to me that the last time I updated was the middle of June. This summer has flown by and it’s easy to see why – every single day is packed! With five hours of rowing a day, there really isn’t a lot of time for other things besides going to work, prepping and eating food and sleeping. 

Independence Day Regatta has come and gone. IDR marks the moment last year when I first started thinking about rowing for a summer program. My IDR experience last year – car-topping a single and crashing on a couch- was completely different from this year. Last year I raced the Intermediate 1x (unaffiliated), this year, the Intermediate Light 1x, Open 2x and Open 4x for Penn AC. I was originally supposed to be in the Intermediate Light 2x but the Tuesday before IDR, my double partner broke her hand in a biking accident and I was put in the single instead. Both of us were really disappointed because we had been working very hard in our double and planned on racing towards a good result. This change of plans meant that my race and therefore my weigh-in was two days earlier than expected. My first weigh in as a 130 lightweight was definitely a tough one, but I hit the mark exactly: 130.0! Can’t say I’m not accurate. 

 I had a fair race in the heat and was able to make top two without pushing my hardest. The final on Saturday was a completely different story. I knew I had tough girls to race and had to have a good race to even hang with the pack. Unfortunately, my nerves got the best of me and I overgripped my oars, giving me the worst forearm cramps I’ve ever experienced in my life…beginning at 1500m to go. I crossed the finish line in last place at 26spm barely able to hang on to the handles. I was very disappointed with this, not just because I got last, but because I felt I wasn’t able to row to my potential at all and test my skills against girls I feel like I could compete with. However, the bright side is that I did at least make the final and got more racing experience. Now I know what to work on and that I have a lot of room to improve!

On Sunday, I raced in the Open 2x and Open 4x. The 2x was a last minute entry in order to give me a race in a double after we had to scratch the lightweight double. We had an okay race, we were just racing people way, way faster than we were. Like World Championship medal faster. As someone who should not only be racing as a lightweight but also in the intermediate category, this was definitely intimidating. But once again I gained more racing experience. We encountered the same situation with the quad. We put together a good race but were just outclassed. But I have to say that even through all the last minute changes and tough racing, I learned a lot and was fairly pleased with the weekend. 

 I love rowing for Penn AC. Every single person comes to practice excited and ready to row, even when we’re exhausted. Rowing in Philadelphia has refueled and revitalized my love for the sport completely. As far as my transition to a lightweight rower, things have definitely been hard but not unmanageable. My diet has worked great and although it is challenging to pass on beer and burgers when I’m out socializing, the reward has been worth it. It also helps that most of the people I know here are rowers, former rowers or coaches and understand what I am going through. The support is amazing. I definitely have a lot of thoughts about my shift to a lightweight rower so there will be a whole post about that at some point! But for now, enjoy a picture of what I eat on a regular basis. 

This Wednesday begins Club Nationals, a race I have never participated in before. I will be racing in the Intermediate Light 2x, Intermediate Light 4+ and Intermediate Light 4x. I am very excited for lots of racing over five days with a great team! GO PENN AC!

New York State Championship Regatta

This past weekend, Marist Crew raced at the New York State Championships. Once again, our team was excited to race here because the regatta had been cancelled in 2011. We had heard that William Smith was fast this year and after our photo finish at MAACs, we were hungry for another good race. 

Our heat was the second race on Saturday morning, with fourth and sixth seeded St. Lawrence and Ithaca. We had a pretty big bobble in the middle of our power twenty that threw us off for some strokes. At the 500m, we were battling for 3^rd and 4^th with St. Lawrence and RIT but our coxswain, Zoe, was ready to put some fire into us in order to make sure we finished in the top three and qualified for finals. By 750m, we had pulled away from RIT but were still trying to shake St. Lawrence, with Ithaca in first by a decent amount. By 1500 we had about half a boat length on SLU and worked to catch up with Ithaca in our sprint. We placed 2^nd but all agreed that we knew we could race better the next day.

Because of our second place finish, we were placed in lane 4, with William Smith, Ithaca, Hamilton and St. Lawrence respectively in 1,2,3 & 6. We knew that it would be a tight race between the six crews and that we would have to have a strong race to medal.  Our coach made us look at the picture from MAACs in order to get fired up to race before we launched and we were ready to go. Our start, which is normally our weakness, was one of the best we’ve had and we were right with everyone from the beginning instead of having to come from behind. By the 500m, William Smith had a strong lead and we had moved up on St. Lawrence, Ithaca and Hamilton. We had an incredible middle move and were flying for the rest of the race. Personally, I think it was not only the best race we’ve had as a boat, but also one of the best races I’ve had in my rowing career. I was so focused and just hammered on it the entire time and after the race, my boatmates agreed that they felt the same way. 

Silver medal!

The other boats on the men’s and women’s teams also placed very well. The Men’s V8 and V4 placed second and our freshmen men won gold. Another result that is fantastic is that both of our freshmen boats made the final. Our 1F got gold and our 2F got 4^th. Obviously, the 1F winning is fantastic, but the fact that the 2F for 4^th in a tough field shows just how strong the freshmen class is and how much everyone has improved since the beginning of the year. The 2F is currently composed of all walk ons. I think this is a fantastic sign for the future of the Marist program. 

Varsity 8+ with our medals

Next weekend we will split with the men’s team as they head to Worchester, MA for ECACs and we head to Philadelphia for Dad Vails. It’s scary to realize that this is my last college race ever but I am very excited to see what the team can do.

A Wild Weekend of Racing for Marist Crew

After our less than satisfactory result at the Murphy Cup, we put some serious work into practice during the week. We knew that we were faster than our result showed and this weekend was the weekend to prove it. With V8 race on Saturday against Trinity and UConn and a V8 and V4 race on Sunday against SHU, Drake, Canisius, Iona, University of Albany and Fairfield, it was time to show the rowing world some semblance of speed.

Coventry Lake, CT

Saturday morning our race took place in Coventry Lake, CT. As rowers, we’re used to early mornings, but a 5:30am bus with freezing temperatures made this morning harsher than most. The UConn race has traditionally been the coldest race with the most miserable racing conditions on our schedule and it seemed like this year was going to be no exception. Once we arrived at the course, we were pleased to find that, while it was sleeting, or snowing, or precipitating somehow throughout the morning, the water was fairly flat. My pair partner from last year and I were especially pleased. Our joke from last year’s race was that it was a stern six crew team and a bow pair swim team, as we came off the water with about six inches of water in our hull. This year was better already!

In our race, we had a good start, but Trinity and UConn got off the line faster than we did. Because we were testing our new “super secret senior starboard stroke” (direct Tom Sanford quote) line-up, we took a power 15 instead of a power 20 before we settled, which put us at even more of a disadvantage. However we fought back through the second 500 and by the time we reached the 1000m mark, we were even with Trinity. We had decided before the race to delay our middle move in order to focus on strength through the 3^rd 500 and we took our middle 15 at 800m to go. This allowed us to walk on Trinity, a place we stayed until the end of the race. UConn beat us by 3 seconds, but we were very pleased with our race. To see the results, click here.

Race prep for MAACs!

Sunday morning we were allowed to sleep in until our bus left at 8am for the Sacred Heart Invitational in Shelton, CT. Our team had never been to this race before and for me personally, it was exciting to go to a brand new venue, something that never seems to happen in my rowing career anymore. Sunday was much warmer than Saturday.

Conditions for V8 racing were similar to the previous day’s race: relatively flat water. We had a great warm-up. It was a little nerve wracking to get on the line with schools we knew we would be facing again in the MAAC championship but we were excited to see what we could do. We had a strong start, but not as strong as Drake and Canisius, who came off the line faster than we did. However, we made it back on them very quickly and were in the lead by the 500m mark, a lead that we kept until the end of the race. It was great for our boat mentally to have two strong, solid races in a row. We were lucky with the conditions but the opportunities were there and we took them. Overall, it was a very productive weekend for the V8 and we were awarded with MAAC crew of the week for our performances!

V4: Picture from Head of the Fish....the water was NOT that flat!

Conditions for the V4’s were very different: The wind kicked up to create a decent amount of chop and we were pretty sure our race was going to have to be cancelled. Fortunately, it held off long enough for us to race one four that was the same line up as Head of the Fish and a four composed of two girls from the V8 and two girls from the 2V8, who had also won their 2V race. Despite the tough conditions and less than smooth race, both Marist V4's placed 1-2 in the event. It was very exciting for our team to have both crews handle the conditions better than the other five crews in our event and overall, it was very good weekend of racing for our team. To see the results, click here. 

As per April Fool’s tradition, we pranked our coach by calling him halfway through our trip home and telling him we left a teammate at the race course. He caught on fairly quickly, but there’s nothing as fun as giving someone driving hundreds of thousands of dollars of rowing equipment a heart attack. Sorry, Tom, we had to. Happy April Fool’s Day! Hubba hubba hubba! Go Red Foxes!

Click here for Marist coverage of our weekend. 

Marist Crew at Head of the Fish

Fall Race #2: Head of the Fish in Saratoga Springs, NY

Last weekend, our team traveled to Saratoga to race in Head of the Fish. It was our last weekend of fall racing and it was a big one. Our schedule had us at the Fish on Saturday and at the Fall Metro (a new race for our team on a 2k course in New Rochelle) on Sunday. Since all the varsity girls and some of the freshmen were racing multiple events each day, we went into it prepared for a lot of racing in a short amount of time.

Head of the Fish Course (courtesy of Saratoga Rowing Association)

We arrived in Saratoga around 8:30 am to windy and very cold conditions. For the women, the first races of the day were the varsity 8+s. The 1v8 raced the same line-up we had the previous weekend in our still unnamed new boat. The 2v8 raced a line-up they had never rowed before, composed of a senior, two juniors, a sophomore and four freshmen. 

1v8

 

Despite having a strong race in Delaware, our eight did not have a good race at the Fish. The Fish is a little bit shorter course than Delaware (3.7k vs. 4k) and it is a lot straighter. We were also racing in a field of 17 rather than 7. All of these factors meant that we needed to be aggressive right from the beginning and row at 32 spm to be competitive.  We ended up racing at 30 spm, which just wasn’t enough to hang with a stronger field. I think another contributing factor was the fragmented practice we had the Friday before the race.  I think that one of the reasons last spring’s 1v8 raced well (in the few races Mother Nature allowed us to have) is because we had been rowing together for a long time and we worked well with each other. I believe a team builds a certain kind of cohesion after going through years of training. I think our eight is still in the process of figuring each other out, as is expected with a transitioning team. As much as it was upsetting to have a disappointing race, I think it was a good learning experience. Now we know we have to work on keeping higher rates, and we have all of winter training to get stronger, tougher and become more of a team. I am very excited to see what we can do in the spring once we iron out the kinks.

2v8

The fours had much better races in a bigger field (28 boats). My four had the same lineup as Delaware but the 2v4 was composed of the stern 4 of the 1v8 and the 3v4 was composed of the upperclassmen from the 2v8. The 3^rd four had a good race, considering this was another line-up that had never practiced together. The 2v4 felt that they raced better than they had practiced, despite a broken cox box. My co-captain, Maggie, sat in bow seat and “coxed” the race. They placed 7^th, showing that they were not about to let adversity stop them from having a good race. 

My four had a great race. It was probably one of the best races I’ve had in my entire life. From the beginning, everything just seemed to go well. We built confidence early on by passing the boat in front of us and carried that mentality throughout the entire race. We kept the rate at 31 spm and just cranked on it the entire time. I was in flow state almost the entire time, which rarely happens to me in sweep races. I felt totally focused and in control. The only thing that made the race less than perfect was the last ten strokes. We got cut off going into the finish and our coxswain had to hit the rudder hard to avoid ramming them. But other than that it was a fabulous race and we placed 2^nd. 

Silver medals!

 Both freshmen 8+s did a great job too. They raced in their same line-ups from the previous weekend, something that I think contributed to their success. When I was a freshman, we didn’t have enough people to have a set lineup, which doesn’t allow the boat as a whole to learn from mistakes and get better together. These freshmen are also ambitious and competitive, whether they have rowing experience or not. The 1F placed first, snagging the coveted Fish Head trophy (yes, it’s a real fish) and the 2F placed 10^th, beating a bunch of first freshman crews. 

The actual Head of the Fish!

 We got on the bus to find out that Fall Metro had been canceled, due to the freak fall snowstorm. Although it was very disappointing to have yet ANOTHER race canceled (totaling half of our fall season and the fifth canceled race in 2011), I think we ended on a good note. Our eight race might not have been what we wanted, but we came back in the fours to end the day strong. The freshmen had another solid racing experience with great results.We got in a great day of racing before the snowstorm hit and then we got to go home and play in the eight inches of snow that fell while we were away. 

Post Race Snowsurfing

Marist’s coverage of the Head of the Fish can be found here.

Row2k results can be found here. 

Lineups 

1v8 cox: J Guzzardi 8: F. Siclovan 7. M. Kolb 6: T. Fillipini 5: M. Ladouceur 4: T. Mather 3: A. Carafas 2: J. DeLisle 1: K. Butta 2v8 cox: Z. Christopher 8: A. Devorak 7: S. Moriarty 6: K. Wilson 5: S. LaRose 4. M. Banks 3. E. Waskiewicz 2: M. Soprano 1: N. Washburn	1F8 cox: S. Cillo 8: A. Devorak 7: S. Moriarty 6: M. Romer 5: S. LaRose 4: K. Wilson 3: S. Blau 2: T. Mullaney 1: A. Khoury 2F8 cox: K. Perkins 8: B. Logue 7:  L. Hehir 6: K. Melendez 5: N. Culhane 4: K. Orzech 3: M. Perry 2: N. Washburn 1: K. Mahoney
1v4 cox: B. Rodriguez 4: T. Mather 3: A. Carafas 2: J. DeLisle 1: K. Butta	2v4 cox: Zoe Christopher 4: F. Siclovan 3: M. Ladouceur 2: T. Fillipini 1: M. Kolb	3v4 cox: J. Guzzardi 4: M. Banks 3: E. Waskiewicz 2: M. Soprano 1: N. Washburn