The Youth Women's Four from Ikaika Hawaii became the first junior crew from Hawaii--if not the first ever from state #50--to race the Charles today.

A small team that trains with a fleet of just one four and a double, the group came to Boston for a full week of rowing, college visits and, finally, some racing--all to introduce their athletes to the wider world of rowing.

The trip, and the goal of racing the Charles, was the brainchild of the club's new coach, Rylie Hager, a New England native who rowed through high school and then at Temple University.

When she began coaching the team after moving to Hawaii, she found young women who were already experienced watermen as paddlers and canoe racers--but none of those deeply Hawaiian sports have NCAA sponsorship, so she and the club president, Shelley Oates-Wilding, became determined not only to offer rowing as another skill set to their athletes, but to expose them to the opportunities in the sport on the mainland.

Coach Hager on left; Club President Oates-Wilding, on right

"I grew up in Massachusetts," said Hager, "and I raced the Charles twice, back when I lived here. When I moved to Hawaii about a year and a half ago, I found the only rowing club in the whole islands. They happened to not have a coach at the time, so I got to take over the program and found an amazing group of young athletes.

"They didn't have anyone to compete against, but will still wanted to train really hard in hopes of getting to college.

"I figured let's go to a race and we wanted an experience to get them into the world of rowing, not just a chance to pull hard for 5k. The Charles is that experience: they get to experience everything in the rowing world on top of having a great racing experience. That's the two parts of it that we were looking for, and so we've been here since Tuesday. We've been to a hockey game. We've been touring colleges. We've been going around Boston, and it's been a really good experience, then it's all going culminated with the race."

On Sunday morning, the crew started at Bow number 70 and finished 65th, just behind powerhouse club TBC from Washington DC and ahead of a local crew from Buckingham, Browne, and Nichols School. There were 90 crews in this year's race, but the Ikaika Hawaii entry was easy to find in the program: the only crew listed from the state of "HI"--ever.

The crew of coxswain Carlee Ann Iinuma, stroke Sabrina Graves, 3 seat Phoebe Reilly, 2 seat Kana Barlag and bow Kate Bartholomees got to do some passing, and some getting passed, to complete their week in Boston.

Passing Bow 66, Brewster Academy

But it was not ever entirely about the race on this trip.

"I love being in this rowing community," said stroke Sabrina Graves. "At home, no one knows about rowing so being here was so different because everyone is all about rowing. You see it everywhere in this town, and it's just so exciting because you can relate to everyone here. It's just been such an amazing experience: everyone is so supportive of us and our like our journey here."

Adding rowing to their watermen skills from their other sports had been really important to the Ikaika Hawaii athletes.

"In Hawaii, a lot of kids like to paddle and surf," said Lilinoe Wilson, a spare on this trip. "The water is a big thing, and the sad thing is that none of those are a college sport. Kids can't do them in college. Rowing is a great way to for Hawaiian kids to do something in college that they love, because of course, they love the waters."