1. What inspired you to go to your first rowing practice; was there anything memorable about it?
My folks and a couple of friends suggested I try rowing in the fall of my freshman year in high school (fall 1992). It was in our back yard on the Occoquan in Northern Virginia. I just remember being completely clueless to what I was getting into, but also I was pretty excited to try something new rather than continue playing soccer.
2. Was there a practice, race or other event when you fell in love with the sport, or when you knew you might not be too bad at rowing? When you thought you could make the national team?
I was addicted to the sport when we did our first racing as a freshman in high school. Even though it was by pairs in an eight, I loved the competitive nature of the whole thing. It also helped that I won.
3. Best race/practice, worst race/practice?
Best race is a tie between 1999 Lightweight pairs trials and the semi's of 1996 Scholastic High School Nationals when we beat St. Joe's Prep to make the final and knock them out of racing. 1999 trials was when I made my first National team as a competitor. We raced for 5 days straight and rowing in three finals. We won the first then lost and came back to win the third. All the margins of victory were .2 sec or less, just a lot of hard racing.
Worst race hands down was my first 2km spring race at Wisconsin. It was the now-gone Big Ten Championship for men in Indianapolis. I was in the freshman eight in some pretty bad weather. I caught a crab with 600m to go and lost my seat. Within that short time period Michigan (with Steve Warner in that boat) went from a length down to a length up. We regrouped and won by a bow ball, but it was anything from an ideal performance in Coach Clark's eyes. Teams came over to give us shirts and were told to keep them because we didn't deserve them. I had let my boat and Wisconsin down by what happened. I came pretty close to quitting the sport all together that night.
4. Best/Anything you've done in the sport no one knows about?
Graduating Ranger School straight through. It's not really a sport, but it is what I am most proud of in terms of accomplishments, most people either get dropped all together or it takes them a couple attempts to get through the course with. Only about 15% of every class makes it through in the minium 62 days. My dad did it that way in 1975 so it is a unique connection we have.
5. Any/Most important advice for young rowers?
Have fun and stay humble, make sure you never take for granted what you are doing, but also don't get too upset about losses or disappointing performances. There are a lot of worse things in life that you could be doing.
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