The US men's eight finished fourth today; they ran with the field in the early stages of the race before dropping back a few seats, and made two or three strong bids for the medal positions before being unable to punch through. Coxswain Julian Venonsky spoke with media after the race.
row2k: A lot of your guys - if you can speak for them - are new guys. What is your impression of this men's eight event now that they've been through three races here just as an event?
Julian Venonsky: From my perspective, especially coming from the start of this quadrennial in 2017, I think this group is young, but it has so much potential that I'm excited to see in the three years until the next one, where this program goes because I have the utmost confidence in them. I'm just so excited to see guys like Liam (Corrigan), like Justin (Best), just keep progressing and keep improving at the trajectory they are, because they're the best rowers I've ever had the pleasure of being on a team with.
Question: Your overall thoughts about how it went, where you finished the race coming in?
Venonsky: I'm proud of what we did. I'm proud of our team. I'm proud of our boat. I'm proud of our coaches Tim McLaren and Mike Teti, and our entire staff. We had a good piece. We're up against five of the fastest boats in the world, and this is the tip top stage. It's disappointing; obviously we'd like to medal, we'd like to win gold, but coming out of it, it stings always, it always does. But looking back, we're proud of what we did, we're excited to represent the United States, and we're happy with how we performed.
Question: Is there anything looking back in the past year and a half, whether it's COVID-related or otherwise, that would exemplify the difficulty just to even get to this point?
Venonsky: Yeah, and that goes for everybody here, really; that halted the world. Again, the way I think about things, I'm not looking back at any of that. We got through it. I felt we got through it pretty well. Again, I'm just excited to see how US rowing and how this program and how this team and how the men's training center in Oakland can just keep progressing forward over the next three years.
row2k: Were there any things that happened during that year that you think capture what you guys had to do?
Venonsky: Yeah, I think just everyone's resilience. You try to make plans. We all had plans going into 2020 leading up to the Games, what were we going to do after, where are we going to move, who's going to New York - but that halted everything, and forces you to not really be so engrained into a thought process.
I think everyone's flexibility, everyone's willingness to train however they can - if they can get in a pair, if they can only be in single, and still have fun with it - I think everyone had a great mentality that year. Can we row big boats? Can we not row big boats? I think everyone just had some great resilience.
row2k: Is there a story that you would recall in your group where one guy had to do something specific or extreme that would really capture this?
Venonsky: Maybe the story is that we didn't have to do anything extreme. I think we all had each other's backs. It was a tough time - isolation and quarantine and testing and all of that. We all kept it very positive, and that goes to show just the mentality of not only this group, the eight, but with the four, and with the entire training center. It was difficult. Having a whole other year of kind of weird limbo is hard, but knowing that everyone else in the training center had my best interests at heart, I had theirs, and everyone was kind of pushing for the same goal. I think that's the narrative, just resilience and doing it together.
Question: There is an ongoing assessment about the leadership and the culture of the program. Did that bother you guys during these games and the run-up to the games? Where do you think it stands?
Venonsky: We focus on what's right in front of us. We focus on the heat when it's the heat. We focus on the rep when it's the rep. We focus on the final when it's the final. We have spoken on that, and again, I have total confidence in USRowing and in our coaching staff. I'm just proud of what we did, and we did it together. It was not one person. It was the whole program.
Question: What kind of changes, developments do you hope to see going forward, in the program and in the culture?
Venonsky: It was a very young crew, so I think retention of those young guys. That's what we have in America; the college system is second to none, and that really develops great rowers - both Americans and obviously internationals. When I was at Cal, I was the only American in that eight. But seeing more and more kind of homegrown champions like Ben Davidson, like Justin Best, like Liam Corrigan, I'm excited to see this new generation, because I started as a young guy. I was 23 when I started in 2017. Now, I'm one of the elders, and I hate saying that, but I'm just excited with all this new talent coming through.
Question: Was there a particular coach or mentor from college that really helped with your development?
Venonsky: Mike Teti - 100 percent. I never coxed before I went to college. He took a chance on me going into Cal, and that's the first time I ever sat in the ninth seat, and I was terrible for that first year. But having all of that expertise with Scott Frandsen, with Luke Agnini, with Pat Schulkers, and with Mike Teti, just being a sponge, that's where I learned. I still have to pinch myself and look back; I was just in the Olympic final. When I started this, I never could have imagined that, so I'm incredibly grateful for all my family and my friends, everyone I went to Cal with - three of us in the eight in this last event that went to Cal - and I have to thank that entire coaching staff and program.
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