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Showing posts from April, 2013

Video Of The Week: Yale Women Edge Harvard-Radcliffe in Boston

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For the third straight week, our video focuses on the Charles River, but this time it's all about the visiting team. Yale entered as No. 12 to Harvard-Radcliffe's No. 7, but the Bulldog women's eight jumped out to an early lead that they refused to relinquish in tailwind conditions in Boston, with Northeastern trailing in third. The following day, Yale backed up their victory over the Black and White with a defeat of No. 9 Brown on the Housatonic—by nearly 10 seconds. It appears some reshuffling of the rankings is in order, as Will Porter's Yale squad is showing some familiar midseason speed and seems to be in great shape with the conference championships looming—but they weren't the only ones looking in top form.

Rowing Banter: New College Season Podcast with Sean Wolf of Rowing Illustrated

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IRAs 2012 (Photo: B. Kitch) Earlier this week, Sean Wolf was kind enough to have me on for a look at the U.S. intercollegiate rowing scene as we approach the midpoint of the 2013 spring racing season, as well as the upcoming USRowing National Selection Regatta . While we've touched on the great performance of the Northeastern men's squad so far (following their defeat of Brown in the varsity eight), the NU Huskies will face another tremendous challenge this weekend taking on Harvard . Out west, the Washington Huskies will likely face their toughest challenge thus far as well this weekend, with the Cal Dual set to take place on the Montlake Cut. On the women's side, USC has continued to look impressive after their great showing at the Lake Natoma Invite, though we're still confident in Cal's depth and talent. The Clemson invite also showed that Ohio State is a force to be reckoned with this season, while UVa  and UCLA also posted some very impressive resu

Video Of The Week: Not Just the 'Other' Huskies Anymore

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Once again, the focus of our Video Of The Week is on Boston —this time for completely different reasons. The above video comes from roughly a year ago, shot during winter training for the Northeastern Huskies . But, as the video shows, the seeds of change were already planted. While Washington was in Redwood Shores taking on the Stanford men on the West Coast, The 'Other' Huskies made a statement in the East this weekend. Coming off a major win over Boston University, the men from Northeastern traveled to Providence , where they took on the 2012 Sprints champs & 2012 IRA silver medalists from Brown , and returned to Boston with the Dreissigacker Cup for the first time since 2005. No small feat, and one that confirms once and for all that this program is on the rise—something we discussed with head coach John Pojednic immediately after IRAs last year.

Weekend Overflowing with College Rowing

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Attention, Go! (Photo: B. Kitch) All of intercollegiate rowing's No. 1 teams are set to be in action this weekend*, with the top-ranked Washington  men at Redwood Shores to take on Stanford (details here ), NCAA  No. 1 USC taking on No. 2 Cal and No. 9 Stanford at the Lake Natoma Invitational (follow @NatomaInvite on Twitter for updates throughout the weekend), SIRAs taking over Oak Ridge, TN (follow @oakridgerowing for live results) and pitting ACRA men's No. 1 Virginia against rivals The George Washington University (last year's SIRAs champ), Jacksonville, FIT, Temple, Delaware, and others, while women's ACRA no. 1 Purdue will take on Crew Classic champions Central Oklahoma, Jacksonville, FIT & more. Last, but certainly not least, the No. 1 Stanford women's lightweights will take on Harvard-Radcliffe, while the No. 1 Harvard men's lightweights are set to do do battle with Navy (though these events may be postponed due to ongoing police activ

Video Of The Week: Harvard on the Charles

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It has been a very tough day in the U.S. The events at the Boston Marathon were shocking to the whole community, and were particularly sensitive for the running and rowing world stateside—so much of rowing's history in the United States is tied to the city of Boston, and so many rowers were involved in one way or another in the marathon today, as they have always been. While the awful events of the day are not to be forgotten, so too must the examples of heroism and camaraderie be remembered—all you need to do is take a closer look at the videos and images from today, and see the number of people running into the devastation , risking their own safety to help others. Reports of Marathon Runners that crossed finish line and continued to run to Mass General Hospital to give blood to victims #PrayforBoston — NBC Sports Network (@NBCSN) April 15, 2013 So, today we're celebrating Boston. The above video, featuring the 2012 Harvard men's varsity eight, is not fancy. It has n

Friday Edition Video Of The Week: CRC's Original Take on Crew Classic

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California Rowing Club's Bernhard Stomporowski has done it again—this recap of the CRC experience of Crew Classic has some nice camerawork, interviews with all of the crew members, and one of the most off-the-wall soundtracks you'll find accompanying any rowing video. (Frankly, we'll be happy to celebrate (almost) anything that includes the stellar vocals of the late, great  Eduard Khil .) As in 2012, CRC dominated the men's open eight event in San Diego, though Cal's entry in the event proved stronger than in previous years, nearly hanging onto a bow-to-stern deficit, with the Little Knights rounding out the top three (also for the second straight year since winning the event in 2011).

[Photos] San Diego Crew Classic, 2013: Editors' Picks

As usual, the weather was one of the main attractions at the Crew Classic this year, with some of the flattest racing conditions to be seen on Mission Bay just in time for Sunday morning's finals. As several of the top junior & college coaches noted , one thing you're not likely to deal with in San Diego is having your races cancelled. The racing was of a high quality, and the atmosphere around the course was great—here are a few of our favorite photos from the weekend to give you a glimpse of the 40th running of the San Diego Crew Classic. For mobile users, here's a direct link to the gallery on Flickr . Thanks to all those involved in putting the regatta together, and congrats to all those who competed this year. The countdown to #crewclassic2014 has already begun! Only 363 days until #CrewClassic 2014.Training starts...TOMORROW! twitter.com/TheSeatPad/sta… — The Seat Pad (@TheSeatPad) April 9, 2013 -RR

San Diego Crew Classic, 2013: Recap and Review

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Dramatic skies over Mission Bay (Photo: B. Kitch)  The 40th edition of the Crew Classic in San Diego was all about depth. There was no clearer example of this than the performance of the USC Trojans , who swept the women's NCAA DI events and set a new standard for performance on Mission Bay. Cal and Virginia also posted very strong results, and we'll be expecting their speed to continue to increase as we draw closer to championship racing season. Also as expected, Washington and UCLA were also very much part of the conversation—this looks to be another very strong year in the Pac-12 (perhaps the best ever depth in the conference, from top to bottom). On the men's side, Cal was dominant—another very deep team with a ton of upside coming from strong sophomore and junior classes, including 2013 Crash-B winner Christian Kader and emerging talent  Carter Crowe . The Cal men's second varsity posted the second  third fastest time of the day on Sunday (behind only t

RR Interview: 2012 Crew Classic Champ Justin Wegner of the Grand Valley State Lakers

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Head coach John Bancheri's program at Grand Valley State has become a perennial contender in the ACRA league on both the men's and women's sides, thanks in no small part to the contributions of athletes like our most recent RR interviewee, Justin Wegner . Justin began rowing in high school, and brought some experience to the Laker program when he arrived on campus in 2009. Since then, Justin and the GVSU squad have continued to post better and better results—not least of which was winning the Cal Cup at the 2012 San Diego Crew Classic. Here, Justin shares a little about his rowing background, the program at GVSU, and his thoughts on the rising tide of ACRA rowing. RR: In the rowing world, we hear a lot about high school athletes who 'burn out' when it comes to rowing in college, but you are the complete opposite, with better and better results to show for it. What motivates you as an athlete and keeps the flame burning so bright? Justin Wegner: Rowing was t