row2k Features
Interview
Seth Weil
October 8, 2013
Erik Dresser, row2k.com

Weil in Chungju

This week row2k features national team newcomer Seth Weil of the USA Men's Four. We chatted with Seth about his journey from UC Davis to the priority boat of American sweep rowing, what he learned in his first season of elite racing, and more.

row2k - How did you get started in rowing?
Seth Weil - I went to UC-Davis for undergrad and their rowing team is a club program so it's pretty much all walk-ons. Someone just came up to me one day my freshman year because I was tall and said I should row. I showed up to the first meeting and went to the first practice and just didn't stop. It's not a very glamorous beginning.

row2k - What was your collegiate experience like at Davis?
Seth Weil - Davis was great to me. There are no NCAA rules for club rowing there so I could just train every morning for the next six years. There was a lot of fundraising; we did erg-a-thons, letter writing campaigns, and more. We always had full time coaches, so I feel very lucky that I always had great people guiding me through the process. Mike Westlake, Desmond Stahl and Sam Sweitzer formed the foundation for my rowing career.

My teammates there were great. We didn't always have the biggest crop of kids, but they were good people and were always working hard. It's one of those things where as long as you are getting pushed, there's not much more that you can ask for. There was a lot of camaraderie coming from a club program where you feel like you're taking on the entire world.

row2k - How did you transition from UC Davis to the national team?
Seth Weil - I was in school for six years but I finished my rowing eligibility in four so I stayed in Davis, bought a single, and just trained every morning with the team in my single for the last two years being coached by Sam.

From there, I went to GMS in Connecticut and spent a year trying to figure out how to row the single, without much success. I raced the 2012 NSR I and got hammered, finishing 3rd in the E Final which was devastating for me. I had done fairly well the previous fall and was fairly fast on the erg so everything was telling me that I should be competitive but I wasn't. After that race I had one of those moments where I had to figure what to do since I had already committed seven years to the sport and it clearly wasn't working.

I was in a dark place for a while and Victoria Burke told me about her experience rowing with Carlos Dinares in 2010 on Lake Samish, WA. I needed to completely retool my approach to the sport, so I sent Carlos an email with my information and told him that I needed help and that I was willing to do anything. Carlos called me and told me life there was hard, but I was desperate, so I agreed to move back west and train with him. I showed up on May 1 and we started that afternoon.

I found a phenomenal host family, the Asbe's, on the lake and they and Carlos basically saved my rowing career. They were really great people to me and taught me a lot about life.

Carlos and I trained hard all the way through the 2012 season and the Olympics. When USRowing hired Luke McGee and Bryan Volpenhein as the new men's head coaches, the national team guys had a training camp in Chula Vista in January of 2013. Someone was sick and they needed a body to fill in, so Luke called me on a Friday and asked me if I could be in Chula Vista on Monday to fill in a for a week. I told him, absolutely yes, I'm there.

I didn't have anything planned when I flew down there, so I grabbed my host family's tent in case I couldn't find a hotel or car once I arrived. The first day down there Luke had me rowing starboard which was something I had rarely done, but I was determined to do anything to make it work. I was like a deer in headlights and I was just trying not to do anything wrong. The January camp went well and they invited me back to the March camp which was mostly a pairs matrix and that went well also, so they invited me out to Princeton starting April 1 and I've been out here ever since and now I am back at rowing port.

row2k - How did you approach selection as one of the rookies?
Seth Weil - As far as sweep rowing at the elite level I had no idea where I stood. I had never been in boats that fast or had any concept of how good I was. The only thing I knew was that I had been training through the entire previous season and I knew my fitness was at a level that I could do the work as hard as possible, which was my safety net.

I got extremely lucky because Luke paired me with Olympic bronze medalist Henrik Rummel as my pair partner on my first day in Princeton, which was a gift. Henrik had the patience to row in bow and just tell me what to do every step of the way. Henrik, Luke, and Volp coached me through the first month or so and that's how I got through selection.

Henrik and I won the first NSR and the coaches basically did a seat race switch for NSR II and I got second there with Grant James. After that, they put the top two pairs in a four and that four went pretty well. The times were pretty good so the coaches went with that lineup for Lucerne.

row2k - What were your expectations for Lucerne?
Seth Weil - I had none. I was still at the point where I was going faster in that four than I had gone in any boat ever, including eights, so I had no idea where we stood. The only reason I had to think that we were on track was that Volp told us it was going well. Henrik said it was going well too, and that the times were fast and since he was fresh off winning an Olympic bronze medal in the same event, I figured we would be competitive.

row2k – What did you learn at that regatta?
Seth Weil - I think the biggest thing is you have to get out of the blocks competitively because having to claw back into a race at that level is not something you want to have to do. The other thing I learned is that the personalities you have in your boat are just as important as all the other preparation that you've done. All four of us brought something to the table, but most importantly, Volp and Luke let that happen by not micro-managing us.

They gave us guideposts and this idea and vision of what was supposed to happen, but they didn't take away our confidence by stealing away all the small decisions. Luke and Volp gave us great technical feedback and set us up to perform physiologically, but they made it feel like it was our race warm-up and our race plan and that gave us a ton of ownership in the process. Looking back I think that's really rare and hard to do as a coach.

Mike sets a really good rhythm and that provides us with a lot of raw energy and he's the fuel for that. Henrik gave everyone a ton of confidence with his experience and because he's one of the stronger guys in the field. The raw bend he can put on the oar is incredible. Grant in bow is a technician; very collected and his calls were very consistent under pressure.

row2k – So what did you bring the mix?
Seth Weil - Oh, I'm not sure. I tell myself that I just saw wood. I still don't really have any idea what I'm doing; I'm just there pulling hard and trying to make it easier for everyone else to do their job.

row2k – Did you guys approach things differently between Lucerne and Chungju?
Seth Weil - We tried not to; we tried to keep everything pretty much the same. One of the biggest things we always did was try to be on split, all the time. No matter what the conditions were or what we were doing, we're going to be on split. We were always aware of what the split was at given rate and what it was supposed to be so I think that pushed away any complacency. No matter how good or bad we were feeling, we have got to be on split.

row2k – How would you rate the races you had in Chungju?
Seth Weil - We had a good heat. Canada was a bit of an unknown going into that race as they had retooled their lineup with four proven guys. The goal for that race was to stay ahead of them and we got out quickly and won. The semifinal was a close one. We didn't think we needed to sprint and the Dutch came up hard and strong at the end, and to Grant's credit, we didn't need to sprint to win, but it was a little closer than we would have liked at the end.

The final was just hot and heavy with a stiff headwind. The race was about 25 seconds longer than we had ever raced before, and it was just a barnburner. I take some solace in the fact that on any given day, any of those crews could take that win, just on that day it was the Dutch. It wasn't a bad race for us; it just wasn't our day. If a bronze in 2013 gets us a gold in 2016 it will be worth it!

row2k – What did you take away from Worlds that will help in 2014 and beyond?
Seth Weil - The biggest thing that I think the entire team takes away from that regatta is that what Luke and Volp have established, as well as what we've established within ourselves is working. We have sort of tasted the medicine and it works, so people are really putting all their chips in now. If we can believe in the system, come together as a team, and buy in even more, what's going to happen then? We know we can be competitive, but can we take it a step or two farther? Everyone wants to buy in, but once you start to see the results, you find new levels of commitment, which is what I hope everyone takes away from Chungju.

row2k – Can you confirm or deny that Henrik fell off his seat during the start of the heat in Chungju?
Seth Weil - Haha, I can confirm that he did, but he gracefully recovered and had he not said anything I would not have even noticed. I think everyone was a little anxious for that first race!

row2k – What's it like starting back up again after the short break?
Seth Weil - It's terrible, haha. No, it's great. The first couple weeks are always a shock to the system and it's not going away any time soon. I think we're being smart about it and not doing any heavy lifting or tons of power work yet. The hands are a little rough but should be fine in a week or two. It's great to back and in the routine again.

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