RowingRelated

O'Leary (left) and Ellen Tomek on the podium in 2014 (Photo: USRowing/Ed Moran) Meghan O'Leary is much more than just an outstanding rowing talent. In fact, Meghan was a two-sport varsity athlete at Virginia —and neither sport was rowing. Growing up in the South, O'Leary wasn't exposed to rowing until she arrived at UVA, where one of her college roommates introduced her to the weird hours and extensive training schedule associated with our sport. Still, it wasn't until after college that she got bit by the rowing bug—having bantered back and forth with Virginia's Kevin Sauer , who suspected that she might have a talent for rowing, O'Leary decided to Google places to row near Hartford, where she was working full time for ESPN. And the rest, as they say, is history. Here's Meghan's take on how it all went down. Thanks very much to Meghan for doing the interview! You can stay up to date on Meghan's progress via her website , listed in our ...

The VOTW this week is a guided tour of the Devon Boathouse in Oklahoma City with 2010 US National Team member and two-time Cambridge Blue Ryan Monaghan , who is currently training with the High Performance group at the facility. The Devon Boathouse was designed by renowned architect Rand Elliott, who gave the building its distinctive shape and lighting in order to evoke the bow of a boat cutting through the water. The training facilities, which are shared by the OKC U.S. National High Performance Rowing and Canoe/Kayak teams, as well as the varsity programs at Oklahoma City University, are extensive and well-maintained, as the video will show. For more on the Devon Boathouse, check out the official website of OKC Riversport , and see the online coverage of the Oklahoma Regatta Festival on RowingNews.com , with further photos and video interviews from the event ( Thursday , Friday , Saturday , Sunday ) that included the annual OGE NightSprints (500m racing under the lights at night o...

Having begun rowing as a high school freshman, Will Daly has found success at every level of the sport during his rowing career. After graduating from BU, Daly was selected to the US U23 Lightweight 4- in 2005, and from then on he has continued to represent the US at the senior level -- a stint that took him to the Olympics in the LM4- in 2008, following a gold medal in the LM8 at the 2008 World Championships. Here, RR catches up with Will on his early career, his experience in Beijing, and his goals for London as USRowing looks to take advantage of the new facilities in Oklahoma City, which now hosts the US Men's Lightweight National Team. RR: How did you get started rowing, and when did it really take hold as something you wanted to pursue at the college level? WD: My rowing career started in high school, Kent. I started rowing my freshmen year, I was really scrawny and I didn’t even make the third boat, so I ended up rowing club, but still loved it. My junior year we went ...

This past Sunday marked the 30th annual Crash-B Indoor Rowing World Championships, and there were some very familiar faces mixed in with a host of new ones in Boston. The University of Washington men dominated the Open event, with two elite level finishes from Conlin McCabe (overall winner in 5:48.0) and Hans Struzyna (second place overall in 5:52.6 -- he managed this while standing only 6'2" tall and weighing in at 185 lbs, according to the UW website). Is it just me, or is this maybe a statement about UW's intentions after last year's narrow defeat at the IRA? New York Athletic Club member and World Champion Jamie Koven showed that he still has much rowing ahead of him, crushing the Men's Masters (30-39) event in a time of 5:57 flat. This would be quite an achievement at any age, and is especially outstanding given the constraints his career places on his schedule. Outside of Koven, there was a noticeable lack of current men's US National Team members at...

Monaghan (left) and McEachern (right), racing NSR III last Spring [Photo Credit: Oklahoma City National High Performance Center] Ryan Monaghan has built himself an impressive résumé in rowing over the past few years. After graduating from Cornell with a degree in Physics (yeah, he's pretty quick in the classroom too), he moved on to Cambridge, where he was in the stern pair of the Blue Boat in both 2008 and 2009 (the 2009 CUBC VIII had a stern pair made up of two current US National Team members, in Monaghan and Stafford -- coincidentally the first two RR interviewees). Since coming back to the US, Ryan made the move to Oklahoma City, and has taken full advantage of the new facilities developing there. This year, he and another American veteran of Cambridge, Deaglan McEachern, combined to form the US Men's 2-, which battled through a great deal of adversity to place a very respectable 9th in one of the fastest fields in Karapiro this year (remember, this category had the fam...

In the most recent development from USRowing this December, it was announced today that Kris Korzeniowski will take on the role of Director of Coaching Education, remaining in Princeton while the US men's team takes up its new residences in Chula Vista and Oklahoma City. While I can understand the reasoning behind making use of two training centers given the circumstances, it is difficult to understand the rationale behind this move. Just before CRI's launch of its new coaching education program, USRowing wants to expand its own education programs. Last year, with the fledgling ACRA Championship beginning to establish itself, USRowing created its own collegiate rowing championship regatta. I'm not sure whether this has to do with bandwagon planning or a belief that the governing body of the sport should be profiting from events and programs similar to the coaching education credential at CRI, but it's a strange and similar pattern. Why create competing regattas and prog...

On Friday last week, I wrote to Megan Kalmoe asking her a number of questions regarding the changes made to the US Rowing program. Despite her busy schedule, she took the time to write back with some clear answers. The information is summarized below: First, all selection regattas will continue to be held at Mercer Lake, West Windsor, NJ. US Rowing's view is that fewer athletes from US Rowing Training Centers will attend these regattas in the future -- boats will more commonly be selected via the camp system, prior to the NSRs. Given this, they will send only a limited amount of athletes to these events, to finalize selection. Regarding the separation of the men's heavyweight and lightweight teams, Kalmoe said that her feeling is that there is currently insufficient space to run two programs out of the Arco facility. Apparently, many of the heavyweight men will already have to seek offsite housing, as the their number exceeds that of the available residency spots. By making...

The upcoming changes regarding US Rowing's training programs and facilities, acknowledged last week following a meeting of the High Performance Committee, have yet to be explained in full by the governing body, nor has any official announcement been made regarding the release of former coach Kris Korzeniowski. The decisions regarding the movement of the men's heavyweight and lightweight teams marked a drastic break with the system in place for the last two decades, with Princeton as a focal point for the US National Team, and the new rationale seems to focus on regional, weight-class specific training centers. This much can be deduced from the text of the announcements -- but will the reasoning behind such massive changes be revealed? There are a number of questions that immediately come to mind regarding the movement of the men's squad(s). The first has to do with selection. Since the new training centers are both over 1, 400 miles from Princeton (Chula Vista is 2, 700 m...

Yesterday, I published an article regarding the changes taking place with US Rowing. After reflecting upon it, I later decided that it was too early to form a strong opinion about the moves, given that so little of the background information has been released. I do, however, feel that it is important to acknowledge the changes taking place, as they have a great effect on the athletes training for London. Up to this point, the most informative article is posted to megankalmoe.com , as she sits on the HPC (High Performance Committee) as an athlete representative. From her position, she has access to the information behind the scenes, and being that she is there as an athlete representative, presumably she has a sense for how her fellow athletes are handling the situation. Overall, she describes the feeling coming out of the meetings as positive. The facts are as follows: The men's heavyweight program will move to the Arco Training Center in Chula Vista, CA, under the direction of...