Will Purman's first language was Spanish; his mother, who grew up in Ponce, Puerto Rico and attended the University of Puerto Rico, spoke Spanish almost exclusively to him for the first couple years of his life at their home – in Boston.
He has since become a bit rusty, he admits, but it is coming back fast, which is a good thing given that the 24-year-old University of Delaware grad and member of the UD lightweight men's team is the Puerto Rican lightweight men's single sculler here in Aiguebelette.
"My mom spoke to me only in Spanish, so I learned that first," Purman said after a practice row on the course on Saturday. "Over the years I became rusty, but I was able to pick it up fairly well on trips to Puerto Rico for training and for the trials – and I've been practicing a lot with my mom on the phone."
Purman's status as an American citizen with direct family roots in the US commonwealth of Puerto Rico qualifies him to compete for Puerto Rico in international competition – a fact he began to discover a couple years ago on a visit with family to Puerto Rico.
"We visited Puerto Rico in 2013, and in San Juan there is a lagoon called La Laguna del Condado where we saw people rowing, and it turned out to be pretty much the only boathouse in Puerto Rico" he recalled. "I didn't even know that Puerto Rico had rowing, but I went over to the boathouse and spoke to the coach, Pep, and he filled us in on how they are trying to build rowing on the island, and to get high school kids involved to offer them opportunities to go to good colleges."
They left it at that, and in the meantime Purman, who was living in Philadelphia, tried out for the US lightweight men's quad in 2014, rowing with the Malta Boat Club. The crew didn't win trials, and his next move was critical.
"After that, I just hopped in the single, and I found I really loved it," he said. "It was great."
Malta coach Chris McElroy took Purman under his wing, offering him solid coaching and lots of water time, and Purman went to Italy to race the Silverskiff and placed seventh in the U23 category.
"I kind of got the international racing bug there," he said.
Purman went home and focused on work, cutting back on his training time to get his career underway, it turned out his boss was a rower in college, and soon instead of being encouraged to work harder, his boss was encouraging him to train harder.
"My boss along with my parents really encouraged me to contact Puerto Rico," he recalls. The Puerto Rican rowing president, Miguel Davila, invited Purman to attend the Copa Olimpica this past June.
"At the time there was no mention of going to Worlds, but he said I should come down, that they would love to see me row, and that they were interested in trying to build a national team that would include people of Puerto Rican descent who are living in the United States.
"So I just showed up at the regatta, and found they have an amazing racecourse; 2k, six buoyed lanes, with a finish line tower. It is called Lago Cerrilos, and it is up in the mountains protected from the winds, in Ponce – which is the same town where my mom grew up, and she didn't know about it. So it was kind of amazing to go race there."
Purman won the race, and then things starting moving really quickly; a quick conversation right after the race and then a lot of paperwork later, he was the Puerto Rican light men's single sculler.
"This was just a couple months ago, and he (Davila) asked 'do you want to go to Worlds'? And I was like, geez, yeah; a dream of mine has always kind of been to race a lightweight single and see how I stack up against the best in the world. So after a lot of paperwork and a lot of back and forth communication and here I am."
Purman is looking forward to seeing what he can do this year, but is taking a longer view overall.
"It was pretty surreal in that this all happened so fast," he said. "I didn't know I was 100% doing this until right around the beginning of July. So it has been only about eight weeks of true focus on racing at Worlds. Training hasn't really been like a full year cycle for me, but this sets up me to think long term."
Purman is looking to race in the Latin American Olympic qualifier in March with the possibility of competing in Rio, but wants to be in it more for the long haul as opposed to a quick Olympic thrill.
"Racing in the qualifier might be a good goal for me, just to do that, but then in 2017 when the Worlds is in Florida, I think a good goal for Puerto Rico would be to have a solid team there. Maybe we could put together a lightweight double, have singles, have a full squad. With Puerto Rico's relationship with the United States as a commonwealth, it's a really good opportunity to build a team."
The family is building a decent rowing team at home as well; Purman's sister Gabriela is rowing as well, but for the United States; she won the Lightweight Women's Double at the IRA regatta for Wisconsin, and made the US U23 light women's quad this summer.
And while his Dad made last minute arrangements to get to Worlds this week, Purman's mom is an elementary school guidance counselor back in Boston, so is back at school now and couldn't make it to France. But they can always make it up with long phone calls home – in Spanish of course.
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08/30/2015 11:56:16 PM