(no subject)
This past Friday the crew team travelled down to New Orleans for a one-on-one regatta with Tulane, and then the LSU crew joined up with us too. Tulane has a pretty sad looking setup for their boathouse- basically a wooden fence set up into a square with the boats inside. They row in a canal, so it's really narrow, not too deep, and you can't see the water because of huge 10-15 ft. walls on each side. To get to their dock, we had to cross a busy street carrying our boats and oars, walk up a fairly steep hill, go back down it, and step up onto a narrow, rickety bit of wood strung together. Because the canal was so narrow, 3 race groups had to row down to the start at one time, and the first race couldn't start until the last boat of the 3rd race group arrived. During the races, only 3 boats could race at a time, but even that didn't work out too well. The canal had a lot of bridges crossing over it, and the bridges only have 2 main openings for boats to go through with a concrete support right in the middle. So, if a three boat race was going through, you had to get to one of the two main openings in time, or you'd either hit the middle support, be run aground, or have to stop until the way was clear. By then, you're pretty much guaranteed to lose. Spectators had to climb ladders to be able to sit on top of the walls all around the canal to be able to see anything. But despite all of that, Tulane is a very good crew. One of their coaches was an Olympic coxswain (the person that steers the boat and shouts at the rowers), and he's very serious about the whole business. They managed to win 5 of the 8 races against us, but coach told us that it was only because they were pulling at a higher stroke rating than we were. If we had been pulling that quickly, we would have won because we get longer strokes (we go farther for every stroke than they do).
Unfortunately, we suffered a whole lot more damage than just losing those 5 races. Friday was a really windy day and, on the way down, it got to be so bad that one of our boats blew completely off of the trailer and shattered on the highway. These boats easily cost from $10,000-$30,000. Not only that, but another boat got a few cracks in it from the ties holding it down blowing about and hitting it...expensive to repair. In addition to that (!), while rowing, one of the oar blades got a pretty big chunk broken off of it because it was hit on a rock submerged in the water...also expensive to repair.
Because of all of that mess that happened (a broken oar, and 2 unrowable boats), coach has rearranged the boats to make everything work out. I am being moved from six position in the varsity 8 boat to strokeman in a women's lighweight varsity 4. The 3 other girls with me are all strong pullers, so we should be a pretty competitive boat. With a little of God's help, we'll go far. I'm excited. However, because of daylight arriving earlier and earlier in the mornings, I now have to wake up at 4:45am three of the six days we row weekly, and 5:45am the other three days for practice. I'm going to be so tired. LOL, anyone who knew me freshman year knows that's a bad thing. I start to laugh about the littlest things and can't get myself to stop. It's really weird and quite a bit crazy. :-D
Unfortunately, we suffered a whole lot more damage than just losing those 5 races. Friday was a really windy day and, on the way down, it got to be so bad that one of our boats blew completely off of the trailer and shattered on the highway. These boats easily cost from $10,000-$30,000. Not only that, but another boat got a few cracks in it from the ties holding it down blowing about and hitting it...expensive to repair. In addition to that (!), while rowing, one of the oar blades got a pretty big chunk broken off of it because it was hit on a rock submerged in the water...also expensive to repair.
Because of all of that mess that happened (a broken oar, and 2 unrowable boats), coach has rearranged the boats to make everything work out. I am being moved from six position in the varsity 8 boat to strokeman in a women's lighweight varsity 4. The 3 other girls with me are all strong pullers, so we should be a pretty competitive boat. With a little of God's help, we'll go far. I'm excited. However, because of daylight arriving earlier and earlier in the mornings, I now have to wake up at 4:45am three of the six days we row weekly, and 5:45am the other three days for practice. I'm going to be so tired. LOL, anyone who knew me freshman year knows that's a bad thing. I start to laugh about the littlest things and can't get myself to stop. It's really weird and quite a bit crazy. :-D