Finals

Finals week is never a fun moment because we, athletes, usually scramble to try to make that 89.85 an A before it's too late. Stress is at its max and rowing is still fully present, but this year it made its mark. The MAAC conference championships were this last Saturday, which made us travel on Friday; this wasn't as fun as it sounds.

Mercer lake hosted us well with cold and windy conditions for the month of April. The V8 went out first and won by a bit of open water to take away what Marist was known as "V8 of the Year" the night before. The 2V8 also won with ease. The Frosh 8 finished 2nd after a strong comeback from a few technical problems half way through the race. We then proceeded to sweep the 4's all with open water.
Having the most points all regatta, we thought we would be conference champions but of course a few technicalities were overlooked and we proceeded to finish second. Yes we are all a little bitter but we know that performance was what mattered and we did just that.
With a long Sunday full of traveling and making it back into my bad at 1:30 a.m., we started a brand new week with a few more exams. The rest of the week will be practiced at JU until we ride up to New Jersey for a few training days as Dad Vails approaches.
This year is looking extremely close and fast. With new results coming out from this weekend such as Drexel beating Temple, Michigan making a late comeback over Grand Valley, and FIT racing big sprint schools, the regatta seems to be loaded with speed.

Starting to sweat!

SIRA Aftermath And On

This was a rough weekend mentally and physically. It's the end of the academic year and people tend to get tense when around each other for too long. We entered the regatta with a great mindset: go big! So for our heat against Grand Valley and Georgia Tech we went all out, even if the top 3 advanced, all of us had something to prove. In our case, we didn't very smart and finished third, but that put us in the nicest semi final. After a difficult and tedious heat, we attacked the semi tired. Now all the big dogs were lined up, and we only performed to an extent, which was deceiving and put us in the B final. With a night's rest and cold winds that don't belong in April, we raced to bring our reputation up to the surface after it drowned the previous day. No questions asked, we did, not the best way but we did, and with one of the nastiest sprints all year, we nipped the two crews in front of us to finish 2nd.B Final Start.All and all the regatta showed us what we need to work before we row up to the start at Dad Vails.


Finals week did start this year, but like always, we are missing some of the action. On Friday morning we are going to New Jersey to attend our first MAAC conference championship. With a bit of a chip on our shoulder, we will be getting off the plane ready to show our true speed. This isn't the best time of the year to race but it shows our strength. With some will power from every rower -guys and girls- we will take home to title.

Chase ROWE...hi.

 Look at this kid's face➚

The Next Few Weeks

You could say our season has finally started. Today, we concluded the FIRA Championship regatta with another consecutive win. Personally, this was a good test, for my boats and all my teammates. Lately, things had been feeling blunt and only racing had the ability to fix it.

The weekend started with the varsity 8+ final which finished 4 second in front of Rollins and 6 seconds ahead of Georgia Tech. Little reminder that the morning began with 15-20 mph head/cross winds creating a rough course. Even though those conditions aren't likable, we actually train in them somewhat often allowing us to feel more comfortable. With this initial win, the JV8+ swung ahead of their field and won easily. Next up was the Frosh 8+ and lets just say that the event always comes with some pressure. Reason is, we've won it 7 years in a row, but the freshmen didn't let us down, and won by a length as they battled a Rollins high-rate-racing crew. With a nice sweep on the 8's field, we moved on to the fours.

The JV4+ went out first in the grueling weather. As they passed us, they were the cleanest group out there leading with confidence. Next was the Frosh 4+, who had won their heat and the overall times by 20 seconds. Luck was not on their side today as their skeg broke. It was obvious that they would have won with total ease, but they had to let this one unfold without them. And the final event was the varsity 4+. I'm not sure if this race had the worst conditions of the day, but no matter what it was not enjoyable water. On this Sarasota course, there are now 8 racing lanes allowing more boats in a final, for example the V4. The main competitors that had me worried were Rollins, UF, and of course Georgia Tech. To add to the suspense, the start was insane because of the winds. From what I remember though, we had a pretty clean start and stuck most of our boat out front to pass the 500m mark first. After that, we settled out with strong strokes but with a lot of energy used keeping the wind and wake from making us crash to port. Since it was the final race, we tried to open the field as much as possible towards the end, and won by 6 seconds over GT. Overall, we won almost every event we entered and supplied our legacy with one more year.

This is a good building block for next weekend's race: SIRA. This is a huge preview for the end of the year to actually see everyone's speed. From past results, a lot of team are fast but close.

The next few weeks are going to be difficult as we travel every weekend including during finals. Exams will be rescheduled but we will work through it. We will be making our first appearance at the MAAC conference race and we look forward to it. After that, it's all or nothing at Dad Vails.