The US women's quad finished fourth in the B final today to place 10th overall; we had an honest and sometimes moving interview with the crew after their race. This will be Ellen Tomek's and Meghan O'Leary's last race for the US team.
row2k: We talked at length on Sunday; is there anything that you feel was unsaid now that the final is done?
Ellen Tomek: That's a tough question because I don't know if it's unsaid, but for me unfortunately, there's still a little bit of unfinished business, and I think that's just something that I'm going to have to move past and work through away from rowing instead of trying to accomplish within rowing. I don't know if I have the words for it right now, but I think it's just more of a feeling and something that I set out to do basically in 2006.
Unaccomplished goals are something that can weigh on a person, and I don't want that. I think it's weighing on me now. Again, I don't have the words for it. It's just something I'm going to have to work through.
Interviewer: You posted on Instagram about resilience, and I liked your comment about winning a medal in resilience. I think so many more people can identify with that than with winning a medal. Have you been able to process how to be resilient?
Megan O'Leary:: It's interesting, I was also going to answer the first question, and I think it applies here as well. For you who followed our path since we paired up in the double in 2013, from having to leave the training center because the double was kind of put out, and since then, it was always about having to figure out how to get better.
I could write a very long list about the things we had to go through, which I don't think is super unique or special, but there is a long list. I think the thing left unsaid is that I'm pretty known for pushing back and demanding better - not only of myself, of others around me, of the organization, of the institution.
I think there are some lessons to be learned from this, in that that's what I hope that Ellen and I can take away. We didn't accomplish a goal, but maybe we can take the learnings from this and help others after us be able to accomplish their goals, and speak to some of the things that limited us from doing that. Obviously, we're in the boat, it's on us to go fast, but I think that we can use our experience, and not just walk away entirely and hang our heads.
We can be pissed off, but we can also say, "We know we're better as a country. We know we're better as a group of athletes, and here is what we think needs to be done." I think that that speaks to resilience and not just taking your own shame or your own embarrassment and having to go away with it, but instead looking it in the face and saying, "That f'ing sucked, but I want it to be better for the people after me, and here is how that can be done." I think that that's been our MO for a very long time, and I don't want that to stop with this result. If anything, maybe it'll cast a light on a few things.
Interviewer: What are some things you'd like to see changed?
O'Leary: I said from the beginning, I think we have a talented group of athletes. I think we've got to figure out how to bring them together and prime them for something like the Olympics. You know, I think that our system is different - the American system, that is - but I think that there are ways that we can either better prepare our athletes, or bring athletes together to be ready for the Olympics sooner.
row2k: Speaking of bringing more people along, there are two of them in the boat with you right here, based on yours and Ellen's previous Olympic experience, what would you want them to take away from not quite having reached their goals here that could make their experience the next time around better or more successful? As you said, to take what you learn from this and what you know from your past experience to give them on the way.
O'Leary: Honestly, I have opinions and perspectives, but often that has to be a personal decision - to say, "I'm really upset. I'm really disappointed in this, and I think I need to do this." If anything, I learned often people can tell you something, but until you accept it, it's hard to really make that change. In a fit of disappointment, I said I hope you remember this and how much it hurts, because that can fuel a lot of change. Quite often, we can run away from that feeling, but if you harness it and look it in the face, it can actually fuel the work, the change - whatever it is - to being able to come back stronger and really assess what needs to be done.
We learn the most from our failures. Big cliché, but this could be a huge learning moment. They have the opportunity to have a very successful career, and this can be a low point, but it can also be like a launch point for them.
row2k: Do you guys want to talk about this? You've had a super complicated year - two years really.
Alie Rusher: I was thinking two ways coming into this. One, this was a really big regatta for me to start on the national team, so I was coming into this really fresh, really excited, kind of hoping to take in everything I could. On the other side, I knew that I had - well, three, but especially two - people in my boat that I really didn't want to let down, so I was trying to be as professional as I could in that, but it's hard to do that when don't have the experience. So I feel like what Meg said about taking what happened here and, rather than having it drag us down and be really disappointed, using it as a starting point.
We both learned so much with this experience, and although it's very painful, it's going to make us tougher, and it's going to make us approach training smarter in the long term. It's hard not to feel crushed and disappointed, but I'm definitely grateful that we had this, and that we had people to learn from in an experience that was totally new to me.
row2k: Cicily, you're not really a newcomer; you have been on teams so it is a little bit different.
Cicely Madden: Learning from what I did on the first time I was on the national team in 2019, taking those lessons and just being the best that you can be from those mistakes. At this regatta, it was super disappointing, but with each race, all you can do - all I could do - is focus on the small steps. What can I do to make a difference in the next one? You're not going to do leaps and bounds, but if you can make a change at each race - as a group or as individuals - that's all you can do.
On this day, that was the best we could be, and that I could be, and I think you can take that away with you - that we left it on the water. There are things we can learn, but we're stronger for it each race. That's all you can do, and I know that I can be proud of what we left on the water. I know I left it for Meg and Ellen because that was their last race, and that's something you have to be proud and hold onto, and make those mistakes, and take it to your next regatta.
Tomek: Can I add something to that? I think that the biggest thing with resilience - that I think I learned, and I actually didn't start doing it until Meg and I rowed together - was when something didn't go our way, we sat down together and wrote a list of everything that went right and everything that went wrong. And then we made another list of "How do we replicate the things that went right? How do we make sure the things that went wrong either don't happen again or we respond better if they do?"
I think the biggest takeaway I had from that is staying true to myself and the people around me who supported that vision, and not letting people who were maybe more experienced or who told you they knew more interfere with that vision and those goals. I had a lot of people in my career telling me I was too injured to ever race again; they couldn't trust me because I've had so many injuries; I was too nervous at the start; I would fly and die, and I was never going to be able to be a sprinter.
All that stuff, instead of using that and detracting from me, I wrote it down. My pro is actually I'm a fast start. How do I become a better sprinter? My pro is I can push myself so hard to the point of injury. My con is I get injured. How do I stop that from happening?
Every time that happened, Meghan and I together, we did it individually as well, you make that list. You learn from it. I feel like that's what allowed me to keep going, because you keep things in perspective, and you realize that there's so much more you can learn and give even when you feel like you've done it all. Just like today; we felt like we did it all on the racecourse. There's so much that went right, but there are a lot of things that went wrong. How do we learn from that?
For me, it's going to be how do I learn from that for outside of rowing? Hopefully for them, they keep going, and it's about how they learn from that to get faster within rowing.
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