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If you don't know much about crew, then join the club. Most Utahns don't have a clue about crew.
To many Salt Lakers, Crew, as in J. Crew, is a line of preppy clothing. Regatta, it turns out, is a pasta dish. Coxswain is a crude joke and a topknot is the best knot that money can buy. But my favorite crew term is "check her down."
To an increasing number of devotees, however, crew and its admittedly provocative terminology are becoming more familiar as the sport gains popularity in Utah.
Crew is like canoe racing except that the boats are sleek and super fast, and races are conducted exclusively on rivers, canals and sometimes on smooth-surface lakes where there are no currents.
Racing boats can carry one, two, four or eight competitors plus one coxswain, which you have already guessed is not a joke but a key team member who keeps the rowers paddling in sync. Unlike canoes, racing boats also have attached oars, to prevent the boat from rolling over, and sliding seats, so the rowers' legs can be used to apply power to the oar. Side-by-side races, consisting of dashes or sprints, are generally between 500 meters and 2,000 meters. Head races are time-trial races and vary in length from 2,000 to 12,000 meters.
Rowing, among the oldest Olympic sports, dates back to the Egyptians where a funerary inscription from 1430 B.C. notes that the warrior Amenhotep II was renowned for his feats of oarsmanship. In the 13th century, Venetian festivals, which were called regatas, held crew races. Today, rowing competitions are still called regattas, with an extra "t" in the spelling.
Rowing is arguably one of the most physically and emotionally demanding sports. When rowing, the whole body of the athlete is involved in propelling a shell through the water. Rowing looks like an upper-body sport, but the strength of the rowing stroke comes from the legs. Rowers strive for perfect synchronization in the boat, and the crew that's making it look easy is probably the team doing the best job.
The official U.S. Rowing website, www.usrowing.org, gives this definiton: "Rowing looks graceful, elegant and sometimes effortless when it's done well. Don't be fooled. Rowers haven't been called the world's most physically fit athletes for nothing. A 2,000-meter rowing race demands virtually everything a human being can physically bring to an athletic competition — aerobic ability, technical talent, exceptional mental discipline, ability to utilize oxygen efficiently and in huge amounts, balance, pain tolerance and the ability to continue to work when the body is demanding that you stop."
Utah Crew is a nonprofit organization that provides rowing opportunities for all Salt Lake area youth, ages 13-18. Programs include Learn To Row (for the novice), Junior Varsity, and for the dedicated athlete, Varsity. The current season's Utah Crew team members consist of a group of enthusiastic and dedicated rowers from various local junior high and high schools.
The coaches of Utah Crew hail from various prestigious rowing backgrounds and care deeply about the kids they are coaching. Utah Crew coach Andrew McGee was the captain of the Dartmouth University Heavyweight Crew that won the Ladies Challenge Plate at the Henley Royal Regatta in England. According to Junior Varsity rower Drew Dey, “During our grueling indoor winter training, Andy helped me learn how to take care of my body by eating well, working it out and realizing that pain is temporary.” Not bad for an 8th-grade boy who before finding crew thought that all organized sports required too much coordination and that a walk around the block was an intense workout.
For more information about Utah Crew, visit www.utahcrew.org
Miel Dey is music teacher, freelance writer and mother of a young rower who lives to "bury a blade."
