Rehearsal Dinner and Wedding This Afternoon

In Worcester MA on a beautiful sunny morning (finally) where my brother will get married this afternoon. We had the rehearsal dinner last night overlooking Lake Quinsigamond and it was a wonderful opportunity to meet with the people who are really influential and special in Derek's life. One of his college friends remarked "That it was like having a window into other parts of Derek's life" and I couldn't agree more. Seeing so many of my relatives and close family friends from all over Canada is also simply incredible - my face hurts from smiling so much (what a great feeling). I'll hopefully have some pictures that I can post later on.

Ridiculous...or is it?

Sometimes to go MUCH faster you have to divest yourself of beliefs that limit what you think is actually possible. Check out this video and see if it changes what you think about gymnastic strength training. I remember my first strength training sessions in high school where it was a scary prospect to try and do 4 x 10 pull-ups. Phew!

Henley Day 8,9,10 and Trip Completed

We raced Friday midday against Henley RC - our plan had been to spend as little energy at the start but to keep our high strokes clean and crisp enough to hang with them. We had a good feeling that Henley would try and blast us immediately and we didn't want to fall into that trap (we simply don't start that well!) Coming out of the island we were very much in the game and were about 3/4 of a length down. I felt really good physically and the boat felt similarly stable to the platform we had when we started to walk back through Marlow RC on Thursday. However, I'm not sure if it was crosswind or a little dip one way or another but we ended up hitting the port side booms at the barrier and Henley walked away. It's an incredibly shocking feeling because you're moving quite rapidly, trying to think calmly, and you're in a great physical rhythm when you have to stop...something like pulling back in a golf swing, or checking your swing in baseball...it just feels wrong.

Either way, Henley moved out to a 4-5 length lead as we extracted ourselves from the booms and we raced hard to get back into it. The verdict was "easily" and supposedly that was a gift from the umpire who could have given us a "not rowed out" verdict but we raced hard enough to get back into it that we deserved a "racing decision".

Our coxswain, Dorothy, was pretty cut up about it but many of us were philosophical about the entire experience. Here are a few of my observations:

1. It's amazing that we could pull the trip off with people getting time off from work, leaving family behind, and training.

2. The amount of rapid progress was really exciting. A comment from another rower who helped us out during our training in the US was "the guys in the boat really knew what they wanted to feel and how to articulate it".

3. Being okay with trial and error...there were things that we tried initially that felt right technically but proved to be flat out slow, uncomfortable, or delivered very little speed bang for our effort buck. And yet, the crew was flexible enough to adapt quickly.

4. Rowing in a crew was really really fun and I think I had lost sight of that slightly - the shared sense of purpose, cooperation, and just those few moments when everyone realizes "Damn, that last piece felt really good!" were really special.

Friday evening and Saturday were all about taking in everything the regatta and the town had to offer. It went by very quickly and we saw a lot of courageous racing, proper and improper British behavior, and the continued excitement of the regatta.

Sunday came quickly and I was able to have a short visit with last year's host, Valerie Nicholson, who had some amazing wedding pictures of her daughter Kathryn and her husband Andrew and also watch the Princeton lightweights win the Temple and the Brown varsity win the Ladies Plate. The other two Yale crews saw their amazing runs end in the final when the women lost by 3 lengths to the GB senior team and the 4+ lost to the Isis Boat Club. All in all, I think we represented ourselves very well!

In the picture above are my good friend and former college roommate Steve Cheng who coxed for Cambridge (Goldie 04 hence the special blazer) and then the Canadian National Team, and Yannis Hodges, who is a former Yale assistant coach, coxswain at University of Rochester, and now an epidemiologist completing his PHD at Oxford. Henley was a great time for reunion as well as competition.

I'm going to be compiling a list of "best practices" on how to best run a trip to Henley because I think there are some really good ways to proceed that make the experience less stressful and really enjoyable. More lodgings, to air travel, to equipment procurement, to ground transport, and meals there are ways to bring a college team overseas that can make it excellent. Having great hosts certainly help and this year Minnie and David Wilson and Keith and Lyn Goodwin went above and beyond for us.

Monday was a day to begin catching up on email and laying out the process for the next four weeks. Big events in progress or coming up...

1. Signing a contract on a house in Hartford today.

2. My brother gets married this Saturday in Worcester, MA.

3. Bulldog Rowing Camp begins next Monday.

4. Recruiting, recruiting, and recruiting the Class of 2014.

What a great teammate

The crew had gotten together for a pizza dinner and I had bowed out to try and work through a mountain of emails and a housing negotiation...And they brought me a whole pizza! Unbelievable thoughtfulness - so thank you Joe Fahrendorf '06 (and CJRC alum).

Race Tomorrow

We'll be racing the Henley Rowing Club Thames Cup entry tomorrow - they defeated river-rival Upper Thames Rowing Club by 1/3 of a length today in a very fast race. We'll do our best to stay in the game as long as we can...good luck to all of you who are preparing for your own races in the US and Canada and to those of you who are training on their own.

Henley Day 6,7 and ready for the 8

I apologize for how frustrating it must be to click on this blog and see that it gets updated every three days during an event like Henley. Brutal...with such great websites like Row2K and the Henley Royal Regatta official page I'm thankful that you're reading this right now. A quick recap to bring you up to speed:

Tuesday - we rowed once in the morning versus Galway and rowed a Barrier piece with them where we lost by about a length. Again, equipment played a factor in that my rigger was making tremendous cracking noises and it distracted me to the point where our start and high strokes were clearly effected. After the business with Brunswick the day before we really didn't need this. Regardless we finished out the trip, checked over the boat, and did another trip continuing to work on good movement. Felt better and better...Tuesday night we did one more lap working on our race plan and by accident lined up next to the Brown Varsity crew (Ladies Plate entry) - they started first and then we did our start and ended up rowing steady state next to them down the course. I can just imagine how annoying we must have been sitting up 1/2 a length and rowing a couple of beats higher (but still making the boat feel good) all the way down the course. Best of luck to them as they start their campaign tomorrow against MIT.

Wednesday - we woke up early because our race time was 10:00 AM against Twickenham RC. It was simply a lot of fun to get anxious about racing again, to see other crews similarly prepared and ready to go, and then to put it on the line...okay limited preparation on the line. Starting on the Bucks station our high strokes were effective and then very quickly they drew back into us coming almost level. We were rowing 37 for the first 3 minutes of the race and finally touched 36 at Fawley and then began to creep out slowly. It was a slow extension of the lead to the line and while we maintained our speed and rating they dropped off a little more in the final 500. Fun note - we were the first US crew to race at the 2009 regatta!

So interesting to break down the race afterwards and hear the differences in opinion amongst the crew - it's good and perhaps even healthy that it happened. One, it means we were able to speak about and articulate what we felt and two, we felt confident, motivated, or angry enough to say something about it. Stern four felt pretty good about it and I may be generalizing but bow four felt like we were behind and having to overpull. We decided against a second row in the evening and had a quick bite at an italian restaurant near the Three Horseshoes. Travel note: Pasta Bolognese should not look like Chef Boyardee pasta from a can.

Thursday: We rowed even earlier meaning the stands were almost empty as we got to the line for our 9:30 AM race versus Marlow Rowing Club. Marlow had beaten Lea Rowing Club (containing a good high school friend of mine - Angus Laurie who was rowing in the 7 seat - the last time we had seen one another was at the 2005 regatta when I was coaching a Trinity Student 4+...Great to catch up with him!) Marlow had blitzed the start and were faster to the barrier and to Fawley than our times yesterday and that played out again...We were behind almost a length at the barrier and we started to relax into a more sustainable base at 36 and they stopped moving. I noticed their puddles looked the same size and stole a glance over and suddenly their coxswain was in view. Over the next two minutes we had draw level and then in the final two minutes of the race we moved a further 3/4 of a length...A rare come from behind victory! Bobby Kennedy, our two-seat and IRA Champion in 2005, pointed out that in 168 races run on Wednesday and Thursday only 3 crews had won after being behind at Fawley.

I'll have to write about how much damn fun it is to be rowing in a competent 8+ and being at Henley...the expectations, personalities, physiological concerns, and traditions have been really fascinating to note. It's also interesting to get to know some of the athletes that I had coached in 2003-2004 on a different level...

Other topics - Henley picnics, other Trinity alums racing at the regatta, US results, Leander's establishment, heat wave, classic board games, recruiting, and ideas for next fall.

Henley Day 3,4,5

Quick rundown as I've had sporadic internet access:

Saturday we raced at Reading and were placed in two events where we lost by one length each time to Kent School and WPI - frantic start and not a pushing base which created some challenges. Ended up making a rigging change and then rowing back in gorgeous weather through the locks. One of those rowing moments where you just say "I am so lucky to be here". Finally we had a wonderful dinner hosted by the Higgins family where we grilled out and had a blast.

Sunday we rowed twice in the afternoon - trying to improve our start and also find a better base speed - again good progress.

This morning we rowed a full distance 2000m piece with the Brunswick School piecing beside us to Fawley - on the third stroke of the start our seven man hit the stanchion with his blade and ended up getting knocked off his seat. We continued anyways and did a reasonable job. At least we have a good feel for the distance at rating. Will try and make it into London this evening for a show (Jersey Boys) and then back to Henley.

Tuesday we expect to piece against an Irish club crew from Galway over the Fawley distance. I hope we can have a cleaner start.