kcrc in the news!!!!!

Outside of the mainstream

Rowing is an unusual sport for KC-area high schoolers, but these girls get to compete in big Boston race.

By CANDACE BUCKNER
The Kansas City Star
October 19, 2007

Not too long ago, Pembroke Hill senior Meghan Schwend would patiently tell her friends how she was spending her weekends.

Schwend had tales of regattas and coxswains and other words that made her listeners say ‘huh?’

“Most people don’t know what it is,” Schwend said. “They usually think I’ve misspoken. The ‘crowing club,’ or the ‘mowing club.’ ”

For the record, it’s the rowing club.

Schwend’s a crew member of the Kansas City Rowing Club junior division for high school athletes. She’s since given up on trying to explain her sport. Nobody gets it, she says. Still that doesn’t dampen Schwend’s enthusiasm for this big weekend. Schwend and four teammates will compete in the largest two-day rowing race in the world, the Head of the Charles Regatta in Boston.

The crew, which was randomly selected by race officials, also includes St. Thomas Aquinas senior Haley King, Notre Dame de Sion senior Mollie Smith and St. Teresa’s juniors Kit Landwehr and Elizabeth McNamara. This is the club’s first junior team to compete at the renowned regatta. Lesson for Schwend’s friends — regatta is just a fancy word for boat race.

“This is a big deal for us,” coach Jenn Jewett said. “It will be somewhat overwhelming with the enormity of it.”

The 43rd-annual regatta begins Saturday and attracts 8,200 international competitors and more than 300,000 spectators to the banks of the Charles River.

“It’s actually the most disgusting lake,” said Smith, who attended a rowing camp at the Charles.

Disgusting and difficult. Jewett describes the three-mile course, with its sharp turns and bridge hazards, as a challenge for the team’s coxswain, McNamara. Again, lesson time. A coxswain (the “w” is silent) is like a chatty backseat driver.

While her teammates row upstream, McNamara sits facing the girls, calling out directions and yelling encouragement.

“The coxswain’s role in the outcome of this race is as important as it is in any race, and Elizabeth is dead on. She’s a great coxswain,” Jewett said. “She’s totally ready. She’s not going to have any trouble. How they do in Boston depends on how well she does.”

McNamara has competed for four years and thinks about continuing the sport in college. Landwehr believes her future is in art school and hasn’t committed yet to a future in rowing. Both Smith and Schwend, the team’s newest members, are sold on the sport.

They’ll keep rowing, especially Schwend who doesn’t mind being the athletic outsider at high school. The girl who misses homecoming for weekend regattas in Oklahoma City and who shows up the following Monday with blistered and bruised hands. Pulling on the oar handles for every stroke can really mess with her delicate fingers. But, again, Schwend doesn’t mind.

“I like being the only Pembroke Hill kid doing rowing,” Schwend said. “I really just don’t want to do school sports. It’s good to get away. Rowing is so refreshing.”

Blogger's Note: You girls ROCK...and so does your coach!!! Despite all of your challenges in getting to Boston [see 10/18 post 'It's Been Quite a Day' on Just Another Drill] have fun... and have a GREAT race. You can be sooooo proud of yourselves! ROW FAST!!!