Junior Women's National Sculling Team

The Last Bloody Blog!

2011-08-14T21:11:00.000-07:00

Bloody being a british reference, obviously. Here it is! My last entry on the US Junior National Team scullers blog, and my last post as a USJNT sculler. Lot's to say, it's been a while and with the jetlag coming back home, and the 3 day drive back to Arizona it's been pretty easy to put this off-- but no more! I figure, it's 5 am in London, so somewhere I'd just be waking up! So here it goes.

We left off right before finals, almost all the US junior sculling crews set to make history by finishing higher than any of the other US crew have done in these respective categories. The day started off with the women's quad. In the pre-race preparations I did not get much of a chance to talk to them. I headed to the grandstands with some of the boys to watch the grand final-- my nerves were probably a fraction of what theirs were. For me, lots of foot giggling and nervous pacing. The race announcers only added to this with the thematic war drum audio and booming commentary-- luckily the girls in the boat didn't hear it as we watched them line up for the start of their race. Field stacked all the way across, the Germans pulled ahead right out of the gates (surprise) and the other five boats maintained contact, fighting the entire way down to get their respective bowballs in a medaling position. It was anyone's call for silver and bronze, and as places two through five crossed the finish line. We all just had to sit and wait for results to be posted.

I was talking to the coach of one of my friends, he said one of his favorite motivational phrases is put simply: just pull harder, your legs wont explode. Talking to Lizzy after the race she said that if she had actually pulled harder-- he would've been able to use that one anymore. Their final finishing position was fourth. Half of a second away from the bronze medal position. This was also the fastest women's junior quad race since 1991, with Germany finishing first with a time of 6:31, and the United States four three places behind with a 6:35-- by far the fastest a US Junior Women's Quad has ever gone. Way to go USA! Making some history!!

Following this, I launched for the women's single-- my final race of the summer, AND junior career. I ended up finishing 3rd, making my ranking overall 15th. Even though my finishing position wasn't as high as I would have hoped, cliches aside it still represented a lot of progress from where I started out two months ago. So no complaints! The next day more history was again made by our junior girls double. Hannah and Maria executed a near-perfect race, putting them third in the B Final, again the best ranking a girls double have ever posted. Our boys scullers also didn't disappoint-- finishing fourth in a very tight race in the B Final, making them 10th overall. The thing about this kind of racing is that you can see across the board from the A-C finals, the racing is all good-- fast and competitive all the way down. Making these results all the more impressive!

That concluded races for the US Junior National Team Scullers. We were all free to celebrate, see our parents for the first time in a while, and say our goodbyes to G-Man and Richard who were both heading off to different euro-destinations. The rest of the goodbyes followed throughout the next 24 hours as we stayed up late, woke up early, packed our bags, boarded a plane, didn't sleep for eight more hours, landed in New Jersey, started missing camp already, made it home (Youngling home), started missing it more, had a nutritious donut and bagel dinner , entered into a coma for about fifteen hours, woke up promptly at 5 AM for a Dunkin Donuts frozen hot chocolate (highly recommended) and pancakes (also highly recommended). Then sadly real life had to start again-- like always! and my dad and I started the trek cross country back to the lovely Arizona.

I said this at the end of last years blog, but I like it so I'm going to say it again...goodbyes are always tough after almost two months (50 days exactly according to Mackenzi). Two months of living together, eating together, training together, traveling together, being a family together...it creates a nice bubble, where your biggest concern is eat and then nap or nap and then eat. The best part is since the rowing world is so small it's only a matter of time until your friends show up again.

We have a few returners next year-- not as many as before, but Ben Delaney, Jon Rosow, and Mackenzi Sherman will be back in the mix. The rest of us, on to the next phase! Growing up and going to college.

So I guess that's all I have for now, like always a huge thank-you to all the family, friends, and coaches that have provided invaluable support on our journey to take US sculling to the next level. So for the last time, it's been a huge pleasure--

LET'S GO USA!!

Moving On UP!

2011-08-05T23:12:00.000-07:00

I grabbed early breakfast this morning, and I have about thirty minutes to do this before I catch the bus to the course.

A lot has happened since I left everyone at the opening ceremonies Tuesday night (hard to believe that was Tuesday). Racing was fully underway for all members of the USJNT, and even in the ever-changing wind, and sometimes pouring rain-- all of the scullers have been making huge strides for themselves and history for US Junior National sculling!

The women's double sculls, of the 'simply wonderful' Hannah Solis-Cohen, and Maria Maydan finished second in their heat on Thursday, immediately qualifying them for the a/b semi, which is already the best that a junior women's double has done, historically. And to follow that, the junior women's quad came back from a less than perfect heat, to place second to the Germans in yesterday's semi-final, advancing them to the medal hunt in today's GRAND FINAL. Each time this boat races better and better things keep happening! So if the trend continues, I think it's safe to say that this crew in on it's way to making junior sculling history as well. Everyone watching and following at home should be ecstatic abut the performance of our US junior scullers thus far, and with the a/b double semi and the quad's grand final rapidly approaching I'm going to ignore the cliche and say that it's crunch time for everyone here! As rowers it's easy to understand-- but to other people it might seem weird that some of us have spent the last year training for something that will not only be over in the next two days, but will last less than 7 minutes. But it's what we do! And racing at the World Championships you get to race athletes who are more like yourself than most people at home-- definitely one of the best parts.

My repechage yesterday (french for second chance) went well-- unfortunately well was not as fast as I needed it to be. I was drawn with scullers from the Czech Republic, Belgium, Tunisia, Zimbabwe, and Venezuela. After executing my race plan I could not make up the two second gap between the Belgian single and myself, putting me into a very tight third place and just missing the a/b semi final. If it had been a bad race I would be more disappointed, but looking long term, I definitely using this as a starting point for what I hope to accomplish in the future! Until then...c/d semi this morning, and C final this afternoon! (times were changed due to weather tomorrow).

Our sculling boys have also made history this week as the first junior men's quad ever to make an a/b semi, or an a/b final after an EXTREMELY tight race yesterday, just barely edging out Poland. Today they will battle it out in the semi-final for one of those top six positions.

Today's a big day for all crews... and it's been great racing here even in the less than great conditions. Last I was at the course it was overcast with light rain, a strong tailwind 0-500m and a strong cross for the remainder of the course. Hopefully that will calm down for the rest of the day's events. Look out today for our women's 2x semi-final, women's 4x grand final, men's 4x semi-final, and women's single c final!

LET'S GO USA!!

Also check our Facebook page for more pictures and updates! http://www.facebook.com/pages/USJNTScullers/184782091585486

"Spares"

2011-08-03T06:16:00.000-07:00

CONGRATS TO OUR FLAT-MATE ELIZA SPILSBURY!

As the spare pair for the JNT Sweep side, she and her partner opened with the first race of the week (spares race)-- and from what we heard, won by a considerable margin. Good start for the USA!

AMERICA AMERICA! U-S-A!

2011-08-03T02:22:00.000-07:00

It's been almost six days since we arrived in London to race at the Junior World Championships. Six days of time-adjusting, trying to nap in order to time-adjust, trying not to nap in order to time-adjust, healthy eating, boat weighing, boat rigging, boat rowing, drill rowing, hard rowing, flashy rowing, windy rowing, smooth rowing, water drinking, crappy exchange-rating, bus waiting, bus riding, people-meeting, picture taking, flag waving, anthem singing... I could go on.

Even though it's been six days, the Championships were not officially open until last night-- It's custom that before any World Championship event Junior all the way up to Olympic, the host country will throw a ceremony to welcome all the visiting countries to the venue. Yesterday, the entire US team joined all the other countries in the center of the RoyalHolloway to watch the progression of the flags, listen to the FISA director, successfully out-cheer everyone, and watch a "surprise" performance by the "Tenors and Divas Incognito". Aside fromthe strip teasing and

step-kicks from who we thought were a respectable school official, a bag check attendee, and Gary the owner of boys New Milford house-- it was a fun, and very British way to open the event.

We then got up early for our last pre-race row. I'll start off by saying that training at the course is a much different experience than rowing anywhere else. There's a lot of small battles that go on up and down the practice lanes- you are always being watched by someone, either biking along the shore, or in the boat next to you. Today I launched around the same time as the JW2x and 1x from Greece, and did all I could, not only to space out my oar puddles and look good, but to avoid staring at their coach screaming corrections in very harsh Greek between cigarette puffs. And from what I've seen, coaches should pass some kind of test before being allowed to ride the spiffy white BMW-made course bikes. Just as a general precaution to rowers, spectators, and mostly themselves.

We rode back to the Holloway with a very pro-Rihanna bus-driver, learned that with the Germans, where there's one, there's probably fifty more, took a VERY nice nap, then went to eat lunch (good as always)-- that catches you up to right now, as we're all just sitting in the flat waiting to find out lane draws, and for the 3 o'clock bus to the course. This is the first day of heats for the quad-- so remember to check online!! Their race goes off a little after 1pm EST. As always the other scullers will be there for moral support!

I'll try and update daily to keep everyone up on what's going on! HEATS DAY ONE!! And as the poster the sweep coaches posted next to the bus schedule says, NO REGRETS!!

Thanks to everyone as always for the support-- Let's go USA!!

2011 USJNT Scullers

First there were three...

Then this happened.

Our friends from Denmark

Woke Up in London the Other Day

2011-07-31T04:05:00.000-07:00

Here we go!

USJNT Scullers (and about 55 others) have landed in London!! We arrived at the London Heathrow after a smooth 6 hour flight, surrounded by the sea of Nalgene-toteing, polo and khaki clad JNT athletes an coaches. Right away I'm going to say how impressed I've been with the efficiency with which everything here works. It's like a well-oiled pre-Olympic machine. Within 45 minutes of landing the entire team was through customs, loaded luggage and all into the coach buses, and Royal Holloway bound. For those of you just starting to read, the Royal Holloway is the official 2012 Olympic Village for the rowers and kayakers. And, with last year's venue in mind, it's glorious.

There's about 10 staff members to every athlete-- whether it be the army of man-maids that clean our bedrooms, the friendly flourecent-vested traffic controllers, or the extremely generous cafeteria workers, everyone here is super friendly and fun to talk to. That or they're all making fun of us. Either way no complaints!

We also had a sightseeing day in Windsor (where the castle is). But as is typical, we spent the few hours looking for food, looking for bathrooms, and trying to locate the drugstore (we found it. It makes cvs look ridiculous). It looks like this is all the sightseeing we'll get to do on this trip, as our London day was cancelled. It's not a big deal, especially getting close to racing our focus is on the rowing.

Second to the rowing, the FOOD! We have yet to find anything in the cafeteria that hasn't been delicious. Everything is healthy and fresh, complete with labels telling you all the calories, protein, and carb count. There's been a few local things that we weren't used to-- Summer pudding (G-Man had four), Shepard's pie, and treacle tart to name a few... but mostly everything is standard, and high qual. Lots of potatoes, and veggies.

All the sculling girls, plus Eliza the spare are on a ground level flat in one of the buildings that will be used to house athletes next year. Above us, the rest of the US team, and the Greeks. Across the lawn from us is Zimbabwe and Australia (win). And down to the right is the GB team (we've yet to see them). The Germans have also arrived, as we saw about 12 of them in their underwear this morning and its only day 4. With racing only two days away, almost all the teams have arrived, and things are starting to get into motion.

We've had four sessions on the water so far, working technique and distance per stroke doing laps on the course. The Eton Rowing Centre is famous for a screaming tailwind, making a lot of the results from previous events here look very impressive (we were watching some video from 2006 World Championships while waiting to get accredited). Especially rowing a single (equals around an 8 minute 2k, versus around 6 minutes in bigger team boat), I was looking forward to this. We had a little bit of fast conditions the first day we rowed (we were extremely jetlagged so I might be wrong), but since then every session we've done has been into a headwind-- so let's hope that switches back before Wednesday!

As far as the actual schedule of racing, the official draws have not been posted, but as far as I know the quad starts heats on Wednesday, and the double and single start heats on Thursday. So stay tuned! We've just had our last bit of speedwork this morning before racing starts-- everyone executed really well, and it was a good confidence builder going into this week. We'll see what G-man says at our secret sculling meeting tonight (it's in our kitchen, it's not that secret. There's a huge window).

We just adventured around campus a little bit (thanks to Erin's keen directional senses), went to the store, bought the first pre-bottled water I've had in months, a new toothbrush, and Erin bought breakfast beans. Pretty per-usual.

Anyways I'm sorry this has taken me SO long (literally almost 4 days) to write-- it's better for everyone I waited for the jetlag to wear off, it's a lot more coherent that way. Especially to the best crew mom ever Mary Youngling!! Lizzy is still alive! and has a very organized closet!

I've got a prefect hour to take a nap (first one since arriving) so I'm going to wrap this up.. I will post some pictures as soon as I can, and as soon as racing starts I'll be sure to post info and results!

Thanks to everyone back home who's following and supporting! LET'S GO USA!

The Last Supper

2011-07-26T18:07:00.000-07:00

So this post is going to be a quick one, as I feel like I've been hit by a small train (pretty usual for anything post 8:30) and am on my way to bed. The thing about the blog is the longer I wait to update, the more updating there is to catch up on. So, in an effort to stay on top of things as my Pre-London To-do List becomes more and more time sensitive-- I'm going to give you a quick run down of all things new and exciting here in the New Milf.

First off, big and exciting- the majority of us had our last supper (note the title) at Rocco's. After 41 days of seemingly bottomless lunch and dinner, it was bittersweet. The steak and chicken kabobs were a good conclusion to a very...very...very long day. 5am wake up call. 6am departure from GMS to Princeton, NJ. 9am arrival in Princeton, NJ. 10am Susan Francia sighting. 11am launch time. 11:35am 2k with sweep team. 1pm LUNCH time. 3:30pm arrival at GMS. 4pm boat wash/gel gloss sesh. 5pm rained out to the trailer. 6pm FINALLY back at the burrow for much needed showering. Busy day for the JNT scullers! When the days stretch out and we get tired, there's many more amusing moments... for example Mackenzi Sherman and I have entered into a very subtle, secret war, which I am winning. Lizzy and I (mostly Lizzy) have created an official Facebook page for our very own Nigel Spruce: personal reporter and correspondent for the JNT scullers documenting our journey pulling hard and going to worlds!

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Nigel-Spruce-USJNTScullers/184782091585486 (the interview will be posted tomorrow).

Unfortunately we did not quite post the exact performance that we were looking for going into the morning-- but usually you learn a lot more from missing your goals than directly accomplishing them. Most of the time, goals do need to be met. Especially since the sport of rowing can be very unforgiving (6-8 minutes to show for years of training). A scrimmage like today can be a serious wake up call. We are leaving on Thursday. We are representing the USA. And we need to be fast. I know we are all coming off of this morning's performance refocused, fired up, and ready to fill in all the gaps we need to make things happen at this year's Junior World Championships!

Three sessions tomorrow will round of the home training for this years Junior National Sculling Team training. Looking back on this marathon of a summer, it's sinking in how much work we have done up to this point, and how crucial these next few days are. The perfect balance of speedwork, technique, steady rowing, recovery, nutrition, travel, focus, and relaxation will make up the last 10 percent of our preparation for competing overseas. I'll do my best to keep this updated as things get going! You know how I love telling you all about the food and the napping-- so keep checking in! Traveling is fun! Racing is fun! People talking in British accents is fun! Spelling the word colour with a u is fun!

Last night in the New Milf! LET'S GO USA!!

Just to get the ball rolling...

Here's where to check for photo updates: http://www.row2k.com/gallery/

Here's the official site: http://www.wrjc2011.com/

Show me your water bottles!!

2011-07-21T18:31:00.000-07:00

It seems that I have a lot to recap since I left everyone last Sunday-- being as time is quickly diminishing before the day of departure, it feels like we're packing everything possible into these last two weeks.

Just like last year, G-Man has taken a small hiatus to coach the U23 lightweight quad in Amsterdam this week. Before he left, an intensive technique session reinforced all of our individual points of focus-- with Matt's guidance, the big emphasis right now is on self-improvement as each of us work to iron out our issues (no matter how frustrating this can be).

Because we have limited time to retrain our muscle memory, very long rows seem to be in order. Wednesday, we had the magical 6AM bridge row plus large delicious breakfast combination. Obviously there were some drills thrown in (and by thrown in, I mean 60 min+ of continuous

square blade, half square, square-unsquare-square-unsquare broken up throughout the two hour row). These drills help you to maintain the proper blade height over the water, and keep both the blade entry and release clean. Very important stuff. To make it even more interesting, almost all of the technical rows we've had (minus the bridge) have been done into a brutal (brutal by GMS standards...around 10mph) headwind, making the recovery of the strokes on the square feel a lot less like recovery. None the less, we were troopers, and were rewarded with an extremely quick row in.

There was also a surprise return of the ever-illusive ice cream man!! He answered our call during a particularly sweaty weight session, and needless to say Lizzy and I had a big 3rd grade moment.

Thursday brought some of the first heat-wave-esque temperatures we've had thus far. Through rivers of sweat, we still worked more and more technique on our rows to the S-Turn (about 12k). I think we've been making some small strides-- and we got a chance to see what's sticking when we had a change of pace this morning and did some speedwork. Joined by the boys (rowing doubles after a rigger incident) and some of the GMS elites, plus an exclusive guest coach appearance we did three pieces. Each one designed to give room for improvement from the previous piece-- I rowed with Vicky Burke, and the JW2x, and after the second piece (we briefly considered highjacking the double when the distance went from 500m to 1500) we decided to jump ship and go swimming-- cool down the core temperature! Felt great, however I did not plan for the small lake swooshing around my feet for the last piece. All in all, the pieces went well, and it's more fast strokes for all of us. Also after today, our exclusive guest coach has been officially added to the USJNT Sculling Champ List, with flying colors!

As of now, there is not a whole lot going on at the Burrow-- the oppressive temperatures have a way of making everything move in slow motion (more so than usual, it took me 5 mins to walk up stairs this afternoon). So we're all sitting in the living room trying to stay as cool as possible (the Burrow has 'air conditioning' just like GMS has 'headwind'). Also-- google and boredom: this is where we are staying when we get to England!! How cool is this?!

Given that the current temperature in Eton is 64 degrees-- it's looking pretty good right now!

I'm officially embarrassed by how long this post has taken me (just scrolled up and realized it's, in fact, not a novel)-- but we're just going to roll it off on the heat and growing affliction of New Milforditis (we all officially declared we were too lazy to take another nap. Case and point)

Thanks to Coach V for the session this morning, and as always to anyone following us on our way to Junior Worlds!

Also-- G-Man if you're reading this, we hope you're having (not too much) fun in Amsterdam! And see you on Monday back in the New Milf!

Bye for now! Go USA!

PS. Remember to check the YouTube channel! We'll update it I promise.

Another Shout Out!

2011-07-17T08:18:00.000-07:00

Real Quick! Another shout out to Mckayla Taaffe, Cicely Madden, Emmie Kehoe, and Meredith Bertasi who just won GOLD in their grand final in the Junior A Women's Quad at USRowing Club Nationals-- qualifying them for the Canamex Regatta to race selected boats from Canadian and Mexican National Teams! Nice work, and GOOD LUCK!

Canamex will take place August 8th-12th at the Welland International Flatwater Centre in Welland, Ontario.

Welcome to The Burrow

2011-07-17T06:59:00.000-07:00

So big news, with the U23 Light 4x off to Amsterdam yesterday, we finally got to move into the long-awaited A-House (house is shaped like a giant A). Leaving the Newbury with it's never-ending ant trails, and restricted towel supply-- we have all come to fully appreciate perks such as stove, washing machine, and breakfast sans Costco muffins.

Matt Naifeh has become our self-appointed house mom, and determined to eradicate all traces of previous lightweight inhabitation, he and I spent a portion of yesterday buying comfort items at Target (sheets, towels, soap, pillow, etc.) and sweeping and scrubbing until we felt our new home was up to par. Proud to say that as of now, Matt and Sophie: 1, Burrow: 0.

This move-in lined up perfectly with our first full day off in a while-- with no alarms we all were all still up and making breakfast before 8 am. Fantastic. Mackenzi Sherman is also our resident closet-gormet. While I was extremely satisfied with my toast-egg-spinach-salsa creation, she set of the fire alarm while casually whipping up some steak and fried eggs.

It's pretty evident that without our whole day laid out in workouts, comfort is a bit out of our comfort zone. Hannah's sitting on the couch with headphones and Grey's Anatomy, cracking up every few minutes, Matt's cleaning (surprise), Mackenzi's off somewhere, Nancy's up in the loft (our room...arguably the best), and all the Connecticut natives are home for the day.

Yesterday we all had another scrimmage-- this time against some of the GMS elites. We did three pieces, one at open rate, one as a compressed race strategy, and one mimicking the first portion of a 2k race. These pieces help all of us in transferring the technique we work so hard for in steady state to the higher rate and intensity, while providing very fast competition (Vicky Burke- silver medalist in LW4X in New Zealand last October, and world-class LM2X made up of elite rowers Brian de Regt and John Winter). One downside of rowing the single, I can't speak for anyone else on the specifics of their row-- but I definitely gained some speed, and am finally starting to get comfortable with my boat change (to Hannah's spiffy new Filippi 1x) after several rigging changes, and one large seat raise.

Even though that workout was only followed by a weight session, we all reached the end of the day in a mild state of delirium (standard for the end of a training cycle), and after too long at the local Big-Y, we fell asleep right away. So for today, the resting is just as important as the rowing-- so that after some recovery we're all ready to hit next week even harder.

These blogs are more or less practice for when we go overseas, and the rowing/life in general gets a lot more exciting... but keep following, we're less than two weeks out! We've ordered our gear and submitted our bios, so it's pretty much official.

That's all I have for now-- off to enjoying this lovely day off (thanks G-Man), possibly go find the lake we're supposed to be living on, and go see Harry Potter 7 (G-Man's favorite). Also be sure to follow results from U23 Champs starting July 20th! Our single lady from the 2010 squad, the fabulous, Alycia Daloia-Moore will be competing in the W1x! Along with the new GMS lightweight 4x.

WOOT WOOT USA!!

Still Climbing!

2011-07-14T10:32:00.000-07:00

The title of today's post was partially inspired by stage 12 of the Tour (which we are currently watching, pre-nap)-- entering the steepest and most extreme portions of the ride, Tour time has officially become a priority with the scheduling of sessions. We all have our favorites, (Andy Schleck, obviously)-- Richard is loving the frenchman Thomas Voeckler's defense of the yellow jersey today. Watching some of the post race interviews, riders talk about the crazy energy when you're climbing at the front of the pack-- the drive and competition of the other cyclists creates a high not only making everyone faster, but pushing the pack to extreme heights, literally.

I felt like this idea of the people at the top pushing each other to achieve more applies, in a way, to what we did today. The sweep boys make the 20 minute commute from Kent to New Milford to scrimmage the scullers this morning. This is a great way for all crews to gage speed and percentages before the World Championships in August. The morning ran smoothly much to the coaches relief-- and served as an indicator for the amount of speed we need to gain in the next week. So back to work for us! Climbing for those A Finals!

As an Arizonan, I'm probably one of the few people here that care about this-- but either way I'm going to note the ridiculous amount of rain we had yesterday. Coming up the dock, a quick eclipse of the sun was followed by huge, fat drops that turned into torrential down-pour-- giving the windows of the GMS trailer the appearance of actually being underwater. Needless to say, I was impressed. 4x bowseat Mackenzi Sherman was equally impressed by the steak and potato dinner we had last night. Also needless to say, she's been waiting for that meal for a few weeks now.

Going on a month and half away from home, team USA junior scullers are starting to feel more like a family! It's a great atmosphere to train with a tight knit group that is so incredibly psyched to be representing the USA, as is evident by the giant american flag currently hanging from the ceiling of the boy's house.

Minus yesterday, the weather has been great in New Milford! No complaints. We're just napping and hanging around, watching some Tour re-runs (there will be a quiz at dinner tonight) before our last session later. But it's T minus two weeks until our departure to London! Thanks to everyone who's following-- check back in for updates as we get ready to represent for real!

USA YEAHHH BUDDY!

Keepin' it Real (again)

2011-07-12T18:27:00.001-07:00

First off- sorry for the delay in posting, eating and sleeping have taken priority in the between-practice off time. But we have hit some benchmarks in the last few days-- we did a few sessions of speedwork, had our second (so much better than the first) weight session, and- wait for it...the first bridge row. For those of you unfamiliar, a bridge row is 11k of uninterrupted rowing to the bridge, and 11k all the way back. We mixed it up a little bit and everyone took out singles, and worked on keeping flow and push over a very long period of time. Needless to say, lunch afterward was extremely appreciated.

At this moment, the boys quad have packed some snacks, and are one-upping us with a 34k dam row. So we'll see how that one goes when they get back in..

Other than this I'll warn everyone in advance that entries will be a little more spaced out for the next week or so. This a big speed-making week. Meaning long hours, big focus, and a collective commitment from all of us here to get faster together-- even those of us in the small boats.

Also as our level of exhaustion rises, little things become not only greatly appreciated, but extremely amusing. Just to give you an idea...I can safely say that brown rice and orange slices made the top of my list for daily highlights. Hannah and I have also rekindled our daytime television obsession of choice. Grey's Anatomy intermingled with the daily phase of the Tour de France seems to be the magic combo.

Not a whole lot else to report on at this point, I'll make sure to capture all the standout moments even as the tiredness starts to set it. Still good times here in New Milford! And to quote a glowing moment in a thunder-stricken bridge row last year-- we're keepin' it real here at GMS!

I'll leave you with some photos from the speedwork last week...

LETS GO USA!

p.s. the champ list officially has it's fifth inductee....congrats to Hannah's on call PT man Bill! It's quite the honor.

p.p.s. Bon Voyage! or Auf Wiedersehen to our High Performance quad! They are off to Berlin tomorrow for some more

high-calliber training overseas followed by a scrimmage with the GNT (German National Team).

Good luck and you will be missed!

It's Always Sunny in New Milford

2011-07-08T08:17:00.000-07:00

After laying in bed for two hours after morning practice and staring at a blank screen, I've come to the conclusion that New MIlford-itis has officially set in. The combination of hours of rowing, hours of day-time television, and pounds of italian food create a mild training-coma. Very effective for making speed, very ineffective for simple math and writing blogs. But I'm going to do what I can!

To start off, we all launched at 6AM for a long technical row- however long technical row turned into 2 x Walk down the ramp, 2 x Bring up oars, 1 x Shove off, 1 x Turnaround, and a long sweaty weight session. In other words, there was some thunder and we were sent off for lifting. Either way we all had some fun-- pumping techno and slamming plates around in the GMS weight room has a way of making you feel like you could bench-pull 200lbs and take over the world. I'll try and post some videos later to give you all an idea what that looks like..

In other news this morning, the junior men's quad was officially named. Jon Young, Ben Delaney, Jon Rosow, and Ned Benning, welcome to the 2011 JNT sculling family! They all had a nice erg this morning, as evident by the rivers of sweat on the freshly cleaned erg room floors. And when I say freshly cleaned, I actually mean freshly cleaned-- the other girls and I spent an hour post-weight session sweeping, vacuuming, rug-beating, and sanitizing the barn this

morning. Piles of dirt and cobwebs later, we got a little closer to the nod of approval so we could back for the long-anticipated 2nd breakfast. Most of us enjoy a variety of oatmeal, or kashi-type cereal-- occasionally we'll mix it up with some peanut butter, microwavable egg burritos (i've yet to be this brave) or the notorious Newbury Costco brand muffins.

On the topic of food- I have a long-overdue shout out to ROCCO!! This long-reinging champ-list inductee has returned again this year as the primary food supplier for the USJNT scullers. Just like the athletes-- this guy has yet again upped his game, raised the bar, and blew our previous expectations out of the water with delicious butter-free entrées, whole wheat pasta, pizza-shaped garlic bread, and endless buckets of salad. Having officially made the move to individual plates, I'd say it's getting pretty serious. Eating like champs!

As you can tell by the length of this post, there's not a whole lot of mid-day activities going on-- mostly just resting, and hanging out before practice. Now that the training is getting going, I'll be able to write a little more about the rowing. At this point, all the boats have a separate focus, and each workout is designed to zero in on the things that need improvement-- with the very straightforward idea of "pushing hard for a very long time". Tomorrow we're going to test that with some speedwork so stay tuned.

Hopefully the weather will cooperate with us this weekend, and the thunderstorms will blow over-- as much as we all enjoyed the row in this afternoon; watching my boat fill up with water, and overhearing G-Man remark on the incredible functionality of his newly installed sun and weather shade on the launch.

It's almost dinner time so I'll just leave you with some photos from the last few rows!

WOOT WOOT USA!!

USA JW4X

USA JW2X

USA JW1X

(note the seat pads)

Hurricane Princeton, Survivor’s Blog

2011-07-06T12:19:00.000-07:00

And then, the rain came. We woke up at 4:30 for our last morning in Princeton to the sounds of rain and thunder. We met down in the lobby not once, not twice, but three separate times over the span of four hours in an attempt to go rowing. After a very damp row, an even damper loading of the trailer we headed into Princeton for the afternoon. This worked well until we were caught in the act in the doorway of the Bent Spoon by a storm that made the previous one look like a few drops. This however did not stop us from the long awaited cookie sandwiches. Also a thank you to my dad for his guerilla-style dash to get the car for us right as it started hailing.

After arriving back at GMS Monday morning, we all split off with our various Connecticut-based friends to have a rare afternoon off and celebrate the 4^th (we are the Junior National team after all…patriotism is not something to be taken lightly). It’s a small opportunity for most of us to have a few hours of what some people would call a “normal summer”. It’s not really a surprise that our days still largely revolved around laundry, food, TV, and napping. I was lucky enough to have not one but several delicious meals at the Youngling house—after which we had a reunion with Junior National Team alum, current Princeton Crew varsity member, Weston local, and all around superstar Margy Bertasi to roast some marshmellows and listen to (not actually watch) the local fireworks. It was a fantastic day, I can’t speak for everyone, but I think we all enjoyed the time off.

But now that we’re back in New Milford it’s all about the rowing. With trials now over, the quad set, seat racing complete, real summer training gets started. Everyone refocuses, set goals, and goes to work. So I’m happy to say that back at the Newbury Inn, we are finally starting to fall into a regular routine.

Before I get into the regular blog, I want to set the stage for all of you not in the lovely town of New Milford, CT as to what training at GMS with the Junior National Team looks like this year.

As usual, there’s a smorgasbord of rowers, from junior novice to elite, Olympic level scullers that come in and out of the gorge all day on our stretch of the Housatonic. Right now, we have the U23 lightweight quad training with USJNT blog Champ List inductee, Pete Orlando (as in…WE ARE PETE ORLANDO) that is set to compete in U23 World Championships in Amsterdam, The Netherlands the 21-24^th of this month. We also have the boy’s selection camp, down to four plus one, coached by elite rower Richard Klein, on their way to finalizing lineups for the World Championship quad coming to Eaton with us in August.

In addition to these five world championship crews (U23LW4x, JM4x, JW4x, JW2x, and JW1x), we have the Junior Women’s High Performance quad training here in preparation to join the sweep team’s high performance squad heading to Berlin to scrimmage the German national team. For those of you new to following international rowing results, the Germans consistently have a powerhouse showing from the junior to Olympic level. This is a fantastic opportunity for athletes on the road to the National Team, and a great indication of depth and speed of junior rowing in the United States.

So with all these high-caliber athletes training at full tilt, the water glasslike as ever, the barn with all it’s enduring character, humidity high, and temperatures climbing well into the 90’s, it’s business as usual here at G-Man Systems. I would also like to add we have team psychologist, chaperone, chauffer, and my father Wil Heywood with us this summer—so courtesy of him I’ll have some photos up soon from some of our more recent rows. Also new—Elite rower Lizzy Youngling and myself have started our first ever “Vuh-Blog” (as we call it) so here’s the link! http://www.youtube.com/user/USJNTScullers

I promise some of them are entertaining—definitely check in once in a while to see some rowing footage, exclusive interviews, and most likely videos of food as training progresses.

Hope all is well with everyone out in the real world! Keep on following— it’s just about to get interesting!

Love, your favorite Junior National Team scullers!

JNT Sculling: 2011 RELOADED

2011-07-02T17:54:00.000-07:00

It's that time again. Yes, it's really that time. Post-national championships, 20 of the best female rowers in the nation gathered at the renowned G-Man Systems Training Center to train and compete for seven seats on the World Championship Team set to compete in Eton, Great Britain this August. As to be expected, the last two weeks have been a whirlwind of time trials, erg tests, paddle battles, seat races, championship races, trial races, hurricane rain storms, good days, and bad days.... we have finally arrived at the first of many finish lines. Like all finish lines this also serves as the starting line of the journey that will conclude with the final 2k course buoys of the Olympic racing venue in Eton. For us returning, we know that this journey is both a long and rigorous one. Luckily we will all start and finish alongside not only some of the best athletes in the world, but with some of our closest friends.

This year I'm proud to say the bar has been raised (hence the title of this entry). Standards were tougher, expectations were higher, and the goals more ambitious-- with that in mind I'm happy to finally introduce the members of the 2011 Junior National Team women's sculling squad.

In the Quad:

At stroke, Nancy Miles from Seattle, WA

At three, Lizzy Youngling from Westport, CT

At two, Erin Reelick from Brookfield, CT

And at bow, Mackenzi Sherman from Los Alamitos, CA

In the Double:

At stroke, Hannah Solis-Cohen from New York, NY

At bow, Maria Maydan from Ridgefield, CT

In the Single:

Yours truly! Sophie Heywood from Tempe, AZ

And in the Launch:

Guenter "G-Man" Beutter

Matt Naifeh

and Richard “Coach” Klein

As always, the end of the first phase of camp is bittersweet. With seven seats, and this level of competition it is inevitable that even some of the toughest and most inspiring athletes will not make the cut. The amazing thing about this system is it shows the resiliency of athletes, even when they do not accomplish their initial goals.

I’m also returning as the designated blogger for this year’s Junior National Team women’s sculling—follow for updates, recaps, and a small snapshot of the craziness that goes into making a world-class team of scullers! Tomorrow we return to home-sweet-New Milford to start the month long marathon of training leading up to World Championships—as always I will do my best to keep this blog up to date as we prepare to race overseas!

Bye for now!

The Unknown

2011-03-07T18:01:00.000-08:00

It's BAAAAAAAAACK!! (again, y'all) This time from, Aiken South Carolina where some of the most competitive junior scullers (boys and girls) have come together yet again for a more extended, and training-focused high-performance camp down south along with a group of High Performance scullers (mostly GMS-ers) to get to know everyone, and transition from the winter season to the faster-paced spring season lead, as always, by the fearless Guenter "g-man" Buetter.

It's the second time round for March camp for a few of us, and we're missing some of our aged-out compatriots, but so far it's getting off to a good start!

All the Connecticut natives pulled a straight-through driving marathon, to arrive in South Carolina in the wee hours of Friday morning, and everyone else started showing up over the next two days. My travel experience was less dramatic than last year, with only a few delays due to some pigeons inside the plane that had to be captured and released by runway personnel. Pigeons on a plane, not joking.

Meanwhile everyone had the afternoon off, Richard, Pete and I bought a new (new to us) launch on the way back to Aiken from the airport. G-man's new chariot comes complete with camouflage swivel seats, depth finder, fishing accesory-holder, life jacket, emergency paddle, and custom leaf paint job. Needless to say, it was a deal. So after sending G-man off on his maiden voyage (sans matching camo-suit) Richard and I did a quick row, while the HP rowers did some 3/17/3 (this has been referred to in previous posts as the "slow-moving train" workout...) on the lovely Langeley Pond (sans white-caps). It was so great finally have the majority of our sculling family reunited for the first time in a while...so we commemorated with a pizzookie! Cookie dough, pizza-sized, delicious!

On the rowing-related side of things, we started Monday off with an attempted 6k time trial, which quickly turned into a few laps of steady state after the wind continued to pick up. But never fear, we returned to the lake several hours later for round two, this time in more favorable conditions, and producing some decent times. A good start to the week!

We're slowly (or not so slowly) working our way through the five carts and 1,000+ dollars worth of groceries piled in the kitchen, and the food war between the juniors and the HPS has already started, day 2. As of right now, HPS: 0. Us: 1. Not one hundred percent sure where those numbers came from...but we have the ice cream. Enough said.

We're all fading pretty quickly, so I'll try and do a better job on posts throughout the week...with more details and pictures to come!

We're also considering moving these non-official (as in pre-selection) blogs to another site, or linking them to the official USJNT site, so details on that to follow!

Just when you thought it was over...

2011-01-07T18:04:00.000-08:00

It's BAAAAAAACK!

That's right! To all you loyal followers, (5417 hits to be exact...just figured out how to install the site meter..YES) with the holidays over, and the '00 (?) decade drawing to a close, we've come to the mutual decision that this weekend is a choice moment for the re-instatement of our beloved Junior National Team sculling blog. Among many reasons, this weekend top girls AND boys from all over the country have come here to lovely Tempe, Arizona (my home!) to partake in the first step towards the new 2011 Junior National Sculling squad that will compete in Eaton, England. In addition to that, this pool of athletes will be part of the system of selection for the newly-instated Sculling High Performance group that will train in Germany along side the German National Team.

After spending nearly 10 weeks living at training camp on the East Coast with the summer rowing family, I'm personally SO excited everyone's finally all out here! Not only that, after months of being so far away from everyone we're finally all rowing on the same water. Things are already eerily similar, as all our out-of-towner's have piled into the homes of various rowers on Tempe Junior Crew, my club and the local patrons of the boathouse-under-the-bridge. As our team is small, everyone is having an extremely comraderous couple days. Here in the Heywood House we have the famous, Lizzy Youngling, Katie Rosoff, Alex Zadravec, Mo(nique) Howard, Dale from Florida, Hannah Solis-Cohen, and Serena Boccara. Needless to say, it's cozy!

After long awaited reunion with G-man at the airport on Thursday, and a brief tour of the Tempe area, a climb up a giant rock ("A" Mountain, specifically if you're wondering) and my favorite sandwich place, we met up with our unusually large group and newly re-appointed coaching staff. There were a lot of young, new faces, and as always it's not only great to see everyone we know, and love but the rapidly growing pool of hopeful's for this year's 2011 team. As a side note, I would like to take a moment to recognize the coaches who we ALSO know and love, and will be the fearless leaders throughout this whole process. Returning as the head coach for the Junior Women's sculling, and taking on the challenge of Men's Junior sculling as well, we have the noted Guenter "G-Man" Beutter. Dan Duxbury, the much-loved chief of the Tempe Juniors, will be filling the role of coach for the new Berlin-bound High Performance scullers. We're also extremely lucky to have with us again Richard Klein (unfortunately not with us this weekend, much love and good luck with the surgery!) and Matt Naifeh who will be coaching the Junior Men's squad and the CanAmMex Group respectively.

Arizona's mountainous, mars-like appearance, and crystal-clean air (sarcasm, for those of you not from here!) has thrown many of our East Coast friends into a little bit of a climate-shock, but nevertheless we showed up promptly at 8am for our first workout of this extended weekend, a nice post-christmas 2k. After a short after-test row in various line-ups we all caravanned over to a lecture hall at Arizona State University for a seminar outlining the Junior National Team standards, and technique from G-Man, and a talk on goal setting by Wil Heywood. G-man used a few practice pictures from this summer for a small what's-what in both good and bad technique, and it gave a few of us a little nostalgia, but as always it's on to new things!

As it's still SO early in this whole process, I just wanted to get the ball rolling, and let everyone know that regardless what happens I'll to my best to keep the blog updated! It's already evident that the team system has become significantly more streamlined, and as a result the coaches have set up an official blog that will provide updates throughout the next couple months for everyone looking to be competitive in the 2011 camp system (http://usjntsculling.org/) YES!

This is only the second night, so there's not much else to say so far! Just that we're missing everyone who either could not make it this weekend or graduated out of the system altogether...and that we're definitely ready for sleep, but what else is new! Hope you all didn't get sick of reading this summer, because hopefully there'll be a lot more to come!

And as always, good luck to all the athletes competing here and training at home!