The Saratoga Invitational, in its 14th year, has become "the biggest regatta no one has heard of," according to Chris Chase, regatta director. Numbers would suggest the biggest part, there were more than 850 entries, but clearly rowing programs have heard about regattas hosted by Saratoga. Youth regattas bring the parental units like no other rowing events, and the number of family members, supporters, rowers, coaches and referees enjoying spring in downtown Saratoga Springs on Saturday night belies any secret rowing society on Fish Creek.
When you attend a regatta in any official sense at Saratoga, you encounter Chris Chase, a whirlwind of rowing-organizing-hustle, who holds court adjacent to the registration tent in a muddy and messy trailer with a laptop, a cell phone, and an attitude. Stop by and you will likely hear a diatribe about USRowing policies, a story about his sons, or answers to any coach who sticks his or her head in the crowded doorway.
This year, Mr. Chase was wearing a smile. The wind that has addled the limited composure of young coxswains in the late afternoon segment of races in previous years (the span of racing that includes the youngest and least experienced crews) was reduced on Saturday, and virtually absent on Sunday . In the past, referees have been almost too forgiving and delays on an already-packed schedule means darkness could potentially close the curtain on the second act.
Racing was on eight-minute centers from 7:00 am to past 7:00 pm on Saturday. Chief Referee and English teacher Jim Flanders politely reminded officials after two freshman eights were re-started after problems in the breakage zone Saturday that "we are fighting the setting sun here," and gently encouraged all to keep things moving. (Note that the problems in the breakage zone were rowers playing the "my jumped slide is a breakage" game. Fun game.)
The format of this race provides athletes with the opportunity to race both 2000 meters and 1500 meters at the same regatta. Saturday is all 1500 meters, then regatta volunteers move stake boats in the near-dark and start Sunday morning with 2000 meter racing. After the lunch break, the stake boats are re-set for 1500 meters. The second day also means closer racing: even though this is not a heat and final regatta, the organizers adjust the flights by time to create more competitive fields.
A few teams really dominated the results either by bringing full platoons of athletes or bringing a cluster of skilled kids in several races. Community Rowing, Inc. of Boston was the former, Connecticut Boat Club the latter.
"We brought about 150 kids here," says Marko Vukovic of CRI, which included the full varsity boys and girls squads as well as the novice boys. Vukovic coaches the Varsity boys at CRI, as well as Masters Men and sculling classes. "The novice boys program is as big as it has ever been, we have 50," he adds. CRI's boys programs are young, but are loaded with athletes. In the first year, the goal was just to get a boat to medal in youth nationals (they earned a bronze in LW8+ and silver in M4+ in 2009); the next year, to bring more boats (which they did in 2010). Now, even after graduating three-quarters of the boys from the team, the coaches and athletes want to improve on their performance in 2011.
Vukovic is optimistic, "they did a lot of good work over the winter," he says. That work won them the team points trophy for the boys here at the Saratoga Invite: a red crew from CRI was a top-three finisher in races all day long.
In Saturday morning's men's varsity 8+, CRI had two flight winners with their A and B boats, as well as flight winners in the men's LW8+, by a considerable margin, and women's flight winners in the WV8+ and LW8+. The lightweight women came home more than 9 seconds over perennial lightweight powerhouses Mount St. Joe's from the Philadelphia area. CRI crafts also looked sharp in sculling events: clearly these are not one-trick ponies.
The Connecticut Boat Club (CBC) came upon top finishes with fewer athletes (though you never had to look too hard to find the ubiquitous green hats), but many of their races were of the "did they get a head start?" variety. Coach Liz Trond has some of the best athletes in her Connecticut region on her squad, including a few who represented the US at Junior Worlds in the Czech Republic last summer, but has clearly given the girls some technical instruction and some guidance and insistance on making good choices. Her stroke, Rosie Grinalds, was moved out of stroke seat between Saturday and Sunday, "a learning moment" quipped Trond, but the crew still figured out how to win every varsity women's openweight four and eight event they entered.
Though it seemed CBC dominated several races, it was hosts Saratoga who won the girls overall points trophy at the Invitational. Saratoga girls earned that trophy with some consistency: near-the-top of most flights at every level from novice to freshman to varsity. The girls' varsity eight had a bit of heartache, finishing third on Saturday and fourth on Sunday, but the Saratoga novice and freshmen picked up the slack.
The Saratoga boys had several top finishes during the weekend, particularly in the varsity ranks in every boat class. The culmination of this was a one-second winner over Essex Rowing from Massachusetts and EL Crossley of Canada on Sunday morning. The consistent Chaminade crew from downstate NY had already pulled their trailers out of the lot and would have pressed the top three in this race, but Saratoga looked like they could be victors in even more competitive melees this season.
Might the Saratoga kids have benefited from their US team guest coach? Over the last week at Saratoga, Kris Korzeniowski has been coaching the young athletes stroke by stroke. Varsity coach Eric Catalano said of Korzeniowski's visit, "they really liked him and learned a lot…he doesn't pull any punches."
With 850-plus entries at the Invite, it is difficult to feature all the teams who succeeded here. This was an early-season regatta, and so much can happen before Scholastic Nationals in Camden at the end of May or Youth Nationals in Oak Ridge mid-June, but the over-reaching impression of the regatta from most of the folks this reporter spoke to was that this was a great weekend to get in as many boats as possible and to train by racing.
Even with muddy banks that set the team tents back by about 25 feet and made rubber boots necessary, everyone at the spectator and launching area in the Lee's Park trailer community seemed happy to have so many chances to compete on the water and at the grill.
Go rowers, go parents!
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