Motley Crew
 | | The rowing team practiced on the Mississippi River in fall 2007. Photograph by Eric Miller, University of Minnesota |
By Sheila Mulrooney Eldred
Tall, athletic-looking female students at the University of Minnesota, beware: You’re a prime recruiting target for the rowing team. Since so few high schools have a rowing program (also known as crew), Most recruiting is done on campus and coaches and team members are legendary for spotting former swimmers, cross-country skiers, and volleyball players—or any tall, lean woman with long legs, an asset in a rower. “At freshman orientation, we’ll see someone and say, ‘Hey! You! Tall girl! Come over here! Do you play any sports?’ ” says senior rower Mary Ann Weinzierl.
“Rowing has this reputation of being an elitist sport, but it’s always been a walk-on sport,” says Coach Wendy Davis. “We’re the one collegiate sport that if your parents didn’t have enough money to pay for lessons for you to be good enough to get a Division I scholarship, or if you’re from a small town that didn’t have resources available, well, come to the University of Minnesota and you could [go on to become] an Olympian. How cool is that?”
The University of Minnesota has two rowing seasons, fall and spring (October and November and March through early June). Races on rivers and lakes include events for four- and eight-person boats. The rowers sit nearly at water’s level in the boats on narrow seats that glide forward and back on rails.
Rowing in unison to the count of the coxswain, the only member of the team facing forward, the rowers power the boat by contracting and extending their legs while working the oars.
Minnesota established its crew team in 2000 as part of a gender equity requirement to help balance the number of male and female athletes at the University. And although the sport has grown in popularity from 74 collegiate teams in 1994–95 to 144 NCAA-sanctioned teams today, its recruiting methods are still unique among varsity sports.
These days, about 30 percent of Minnesota’s rowers picked up experience in high school with local club teams, but the majority of athletes are still transplants from other sports. It makes them all the more proud of their success.
Last year, for the first time, the squad won the Big Ten championship and finished sixth at the national NCAA meet. Senior Jennifer Barnes was named a first-team all-American for a second year, and rowing’s Big Ten Athlete of the Year. “A lot of people say, ‘Oh, your team is just a bunch of walkons,’ ” Weinzierl says. “But they know what it is to win Big Tens, to go to NCAAs, so now they know we’re good.”
Last year, a mix of former cross-country skiers, softball and basketball players, even marching band members, rowed in the novice boat, a division for athletes in their first year of rowing. At the Big Ten championship, they placed first among novices. “To hear them all screaming [when they won] was so amazing,” Weinzierl said. “None of them had ever rowed before.”
The biggest surprise, athletes usually find, is the intensity of the sport. Senior Lauren Van Proosdy played soccer, basketball, and volleyball in high school in Madison, Wisconsin,  | | Minnesota aims to defend its 2007 Big Ten rowing championship. Photo courtesy of U of M Athletics. |
before trying rowing with a club team. “It’s the hardest,” she says, “because you need full-body intensity for a long period of time.”
Working with a team of walk-ons has unexpected advantages. These athletes personify the ideal of the student athlete: They came to Minnesota to study, and finding a niche in athletics was a bonus. At Minnesota, the team’s average GPA is 3.24. Weinzierl, for example, valedictorian of her high school class and a microbiology major, had already been admitted to Minnesota’s science program before she knew about the rowing team. And Barnes is a chemical engineering major who earned 10 letters for athletics and academics in high school.
Indeed, the team’s excitement about the new $4.6 million boathouse that architects hail as “elegantly simple” comes largely from the fact that it gives the athletes more time to study. Designed by HGA Architects and Engineers in Minneapolis, the 17,600-square-foot University Boathouse replaces a tent that served as boat storage and a trailer that served as a locker room.
Now, athletes train year-round in an indoor training tank and on ergometers with views of the Mississippi. But most important, Davis says, the new boathouse maximizes training efficiency. “We train for our season-ending race during finals, and for the first time ever we were able to get through practice and release them early,” Davis says. Boats no longer need to be hauled to the river. “That extra hour a day adds up to three extra weeks for them to be students.”
And then there are the hot showers. “Being able to have a shower after practice is amazing, especially in February to be able to come in and warm up and change in something bigger than a trailer,” Van Proosdy says.
Despite graduating 14 rowers, including six of the nine from the first varsity eight boat (the team’s fastest boat), the team has high aspirations for the current season. “Once you see something happening you feel it’s much more achievable,” Weinzierl says. “There’s just this drive this year; motivation like I’ve never seen in four years.”
Returning to the NCAA championships is Davis’ first goal. Another Big Ten championship along the way is also a goal, although it may not seem as assured as last year, when, much to Davis’s superstitious dismay, a Big Ten championship seemed so certain that the team’s rigger (akin to an equipment manager) had a victory banner printed before the tournament. “We’re still on track to possibly win the Big Ten,” Van Proosdy says. “We’ve already tasted victory. We’re eager to have some more and we know the hard work it’ll take to get there.”
In the meantime, Davis never stops recruiting. She sends letters to every incoming female freshman and admits she’s stopped promising-looking prospects on the street to introduce herself. In other words, if you’re tall and athletic and not interested in rowing, hide.
Sheila Mulrooney Eldred is a Minneapolis-based freelance writer.
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