Episode 17: Jefferson Dad Vail Regatta Day 2

[00:00:09] Speaker A: Welcome back, I'm Alicia Cushman and this is the gather. It is officially day two at the 87th Jefferson Dadvale Regatta and it is turned into an awesome day. We thought the weather was going to be pretty bad but it's been pretty awesome. Today we are focused on the rowers perspective at this regatta so we're going to have a few rowers with us today. At the moment we have some rowers from tribe William and Mary. We have Maeve, I'm going to ask you to repronounce your last name. [00:00:37] Speaker B: Parkel Road. [00:00:37] Speaker A: Thank you. Alex Duel and Daniel Johnson. [00:00:41] Speaker C: Hello. [00:00:42] Speaker A: And so I'm going to ask them to just briefly introduce themselves and say kind of who they are and how they got to be here today. And then I'm going to ask them to tell me what they think the best thing about rowing is. [00:00:54] Speaker D: All right. My name is Alex, I have been at William Mary Rowing for all four years. I am a graduating senior so I've got a lot to look back on. I joined my freshman year after having done it in high school so kind of knew going in that this was something that I wanted to do and it has been an absolute joy to be part of this team. [00:01:15] Speaker E: My name is Daniel, I've only also in the Mary, also a graduating senior but I was only on the team for two years cause I transferred in from the Richard Bland called Juliam and Mary. So after four years of high school, had a two year hiatus away from the sport, missed it a lot, couldn't wait to get back, immediately joined the team, got into a double with Alex and yeah, it was super fun, it was great. [00:01:39] Speaker B: And I'm Maeve, I've been rowing at William Mary for two years now so I still have two more to go and I rode for three years at Wakefield High School with these two and I also, I was not sure that I was going to keep rowing when I went to school but after about a month of not doing it I realized that I kind of went crazy when I didn't have it in my life. So I joined and it was a great decision. [00:02:07] Speaker F: One of the great things about William and Mary is that it's a club team versus a D1 and we've had some discussions with D1 athletes but could you talk a little bit about what's it like to do club rowing in college and maybe what's the difference? [00:02:24] Speaker D: That's right, yeah. I mean it's a super special thing because club teams are totally student run so students have the opportunity to make all Decisions about what kinds of regattas to go to, how to fundraise, where that money goes, everything that goes up to basically anything you can think of. Logistically, there's going to be students behind it, which is a lot of work and it puts a lot on your plate, but it also gives you a really cool opportunity to get to see rowing from a different perspective than, you know, high school teams. Most of the time when you're rowing there, you're sort of just, you know, you're doing what you're told and you're part of the team. But there's a lot that goes on behind the scenes that you don't realize. I think varsity teams are pretty similar. I can't speak to it, but I know that they have a lot of. A lot more coaching staff than cloud. Club teams generally do a lot of administrative help, but being able to take on leadership roles and to be so encouraged to do that right away just makes the experience so much more meaningful because you really feel like you're in helping the team grow and build and grow. You're doing something for your friends and for your peers, which is just a fantastically meaningful experience. [00:03:33] Speaker C: Maeve, you mentioned a little earlier about the Dadvale specifically because there are D1 schools here and club teams here. Can you talk a little bit about how that is for a club team participant? [00:03:46] Speaker B: Yeah, I think it's. It's super interesting because we've had a couple races where we've been in open categories, so racing against other club teams and then also racing against varsity schools, which originally to me was super intimidating having someone on, like, that level in your race with you. But I found it to be super fun and I think it's super cool to be able to say that you've raced against division teams, um, and just being able to see, like, the level to which people are able to compete and know that, like, you're in the same race as them. I think it's super motivating too. [00:04:18] Speaker E: But, yeah, yeah, my experience on the club team is. Is way smaller and you get. You're kind of. You're in the. You're in one boat at least. Our men's team is. How many men are at this regatta? 6. There are 6 million men at this regatta. It's very, very small team. So like, every day at practice, every regatta, it's been me and Alex in the double. And since for a while we had only one coach, so it would be our one coach out on the river with maybe like five boats. So it was just Me and him basically on our own kind of self coaching self kind of feeling it out and then to win regatta's to come. To come, like do, like do how we did today feels, feels good knowing that, like the whole team is student run. Sometimes if like coach is preoccupied with another team, sometimes practice is student run. But yeah, I feel like you've done more. You've done more. [00:05:21] Speaker G: Can you talk about, like unity on your team and your team's culture and sort of how you bond with each other and how that maybe translates to your performance on the water? [00:05:32] Speaker D: Yeah, I think the fact that it is so student run is a big part of that because everyone feels like they've got a stake in it. You know, I think most people on this team, maybe close to half at least, have been on some sort of exec position, some leadership position. They've been in the meetings where we've discussed everything from, you know, how are we going to trailer and get it in here? Who are we going to pay to drive the trailer? You know, what's our insurance premium going to be like in the next year? I mean, wow, you really do get into the nitty gritty of it. And I think just having that, being part of that conversation and seeing, you know, the end goal, seeing the. Your stakes in it and at least knowing the people who are doing it just makes the team culture so really, really quite tight. It feels like something that, you know. And of course, I have to say that our coaches do a fantastic job and they help enormously and we couldn't do it without them. But to look around at, you know, your peers and say, wow, we really built this is an incredible feeling. [00:06:30] Speaker E: There's also a lot more, a lot more social kind of opportunities on a club team than a D1 team. I think there's a lot more rules for D1 teams. [00:06:41] Speaker D: Yeah, we're off the leash a little bit, so to speak. [00:06:44] Speaker E: Yeah, like, we've had like spring breaks in Florida where it's literally 12 William Mary students in a van driving down to Florida. Yeah, it can get a little hectic. A lot of stuff can happen, especially with vans. [00:07:01] Speaker B: But I mean, we've had like life or death situations together. You know, I was in a van going to Florida. We had like three allergic reactions, like trauma. Bonding is real on this team for sure. [00:07:15] Speaker D: Yeah, we hopefully our rec department isn't listening too closely to this, but that's what you get when you have, you know, the students in charge. [00:07:22] Speaker G: I was gonna say don't say anything. You don't Want your mothers to hear about later. [00:07:28] Speaker F: So over the years, you've had a lot of. You've had coaching over the years. And I'm curious as you've. What's some advice that you've heard from your coaches that you are kind of. That has stuck with you or that you're taking with you? [00:07:42] Speaker E: Actually, we were recently at a pretty big regatta. We were ahead of the Charles in Boston of four. And it's. You're never. At least I am never not nervous, no matter how much training you get, no matter how much you know that where you are, where you stack up. And our high school coach, Coach Russell, was there with one Arlington. Yeah. And he came over to wish us luck and to kind of send us off before we raced. And I asked him any, any last pieces of advice and he's. He just, in a very rustled way, he went, well, rowing's just not that complicated. And it's, it's honestly good advice if you're. If you're in the, in the race and you're thinking about every little thing, you're going to mess yourself up. You're going to. You're going to trip yourself up. You just need to think of. You just have like one or two things and you got to trust yourself to get through it. [00:08:36] Speaker G: It's good advice that, like, don't overthink it. Like, don't trust your practice. Trust that you know what you're doing. It's good advice. [00:08:44] Speaker B: Another piece of advice? Well, I have two from Russell. One is a bit more serious. And that was just. He always said it's about the body oddity. Oddity. He talked to that. Like, he, he always made sure that we were focused on, like, endurance so that during the middle of the race we could pull ahead because that's like, what my boat would always do. We would always start a little bit behind. And so we just needed to make sure that we had the mental and physical strength to keep pushing, to make sure that we were able to pull ahead. And apart from that, he would always just tell us, tough bitches finish first. That was his motto for us my senior year of high school. So anytime I needed his voice in my head, I heard him saying that. [00:09:22] Speaker E: So. [00:09:22] Speaker C: So I think that the girls team actually had unis made up with tbff. So it stuck. [00:09:31] Speaker A: It's so funny. [00:09:32] Speaker B: We. [00:09:32] Speaker A: We interviewed Russell on our podcast and we have mentioned that Russell has sort of tendrils all over the rowing community. And I think this is a really good example of that. You hear Russell come up in a lot of the rowers. One thing I'm really curious about is I love that you all in this regatta are all sculling. This regatta is not just a sweet regatta, it's a sculling regatta. There's somewhat. There's a place for everyone at Dadvale and all the different boat classes, but that's not true about a lot of collegiate regattas. Right. And so talk a little bit about sculling and sculling at the college level. [00:10:05] Speaker D: Yeah, absolutely. And I think that a lot of this has to do with the opportunities that this regatta has for club teams and smaller teams as well, because sculling is a great equalizer when it comes to rowing. I think to field great eights, it takes a lot of depth in a program. And that's the thing that varsity programs do very easily because they recruit for it and they have all these incentives. And people usually go into these sorts of schools knowing that they want to row. Club teams have a lot harder time finding even eight guys. Like we mentioned, there's six guys here. We couldn't field an eight if we wanted to. So going to small boats and particularly sculling boats just gives teams that aren't quite so large the opportunity to really fight against teams that are. I mean, we were racing Temple and Drexel in our competitions and, you know, we're putting up the fight to them, and that's something that we could never have done in innate, at least with the size of our team. So I think that having these sculling events and encouraging sculling is a really great thing for equity in the sport between these really huge competitors versus smaller teams like ours. [00:11:11] Speaker E: Yeah. Also speaking of a great equalizer, me and Alex have been. Have been beating. Have been beating guys bigger than us all season, and it feels so good every time. And I think it's something about like a small boat, if you're just throwing yourself around, you're going to slow yourself down. But yeah, it's a great equalizer, not just for the depth of your team, but for the size of the rower. [00:11:35] Speaker D: Right? We. [00:11:36] Speaker E: Yeah, if you're the better rower in a sculling boat, you're going to win. [00:11:41] Speaker D: Yeah, we had a really great race last Syra, which was a couple weeks ago. And Syra has the great betting tee tradition where the winning team gets the betting tees of all the teams that they beat. And we were at our trailer getting betting tees from all of these teams. And the number one thing we got asked is they kind of looked us up and down and saw, wow. Oh, my God. What are you guys, 2Ks? Because almost everyone was about 30 seconds faster than us, couldn't believe that. That we were the one. I mean, they thought they were at the wrong trailer half the time. So. Yeah, it just goes to show that sculling, I mean, it's a very technical, demanding sort of thing. You've got twice the oars that you need to balance and, you know, less people to do that work. [00:12:20] Speaker C: And, Maeve, you were sculling here, too? [00:12:23] Speaker B: Yes, well, so I am way behind Alex and Daniel, but I pretty much learned to skull, like, two weeks ago, so. As did one other member in my boat. [00:12:38] Speaker C: And you're in a quad? [00:12:39] Speaker B: I'm in a quad, yeah. I'm racing the quad, and it's an open category, so it's pretty competitive. But we were not able to send an eight to this race, so the sculling gave us an opportunity to be able to come and participate, which is awesome. And it's great because I've been able to actually learn how to scull, which I've been wanting to do for a while. But, yeah, it's been different and I think I like it. But the jury might still be out on that one. But, yeah. [00:13:09] Speaker F: So one of my jobs on the podcast is to ask the questions because I usually don't know what people are saying. So when you say it's an open race, what does that mean? [00:13:18] Speaker B: It means that we have club teams racing in it. We also have varsity teams, so we were racing against mit, and then there was us. You know, we learned to row two weeks ago, but. But it's been super cool to be able to race against those teams. [00:13:34] Speaker A: So I'm gonna throw a little bit of a curve ball at you, Maeve. Don't be mad at me, but I was sitting here as you were talking, and I was a little nostalgic about a conversation we had yesterday. So this is the 50th anniversary of women's rowing at Dadvale, and I think it's really cool that you're here. Right. And you wouldn't necessarily be here without that boat. So can you talk a little bit about what it's like, your experience as a woman rower here at Dadville? [00:13:59] Speaker B: Oh, yeah. Okay. Well, I at least know that I got that question on trivia. Right. So that's good. But, yeah, I think it's super special. I always hear about, you know, like, a lot of my friends have gone on to now row at division schools for rowing, which is amazing. But I hear a lot about how just how many opportunities there are for women, because I think, you know, it's becoming more of a big thing now. But I once heard that there are more scholarships available than there actually are women in rowing. So I think it's super cool to see how many more people are actually getting into it. And, you know, like, at school, I don't recognize it that much, how special it is because our women's team is significantly larger than our men's team. But it is. It's special to be able to, like, look back and see that it wasn't always like that. And there was a race once at Occoquan in high school where we had a woman come up to us and she was talking about how, you know, back in her day, she would come to these races and there were no women's boats at those races. And she would just tell us how. How proud she was of us to be there. And just hearing that from someone who I'd never met before, but it was super special hearing about someone who loves rowing just as much as you, but didn't have those same opportunities, it, like, brings you back and makes you realize how, like, how lucky you are to have these opportunities. [00:15:28] Speaker F: And the other thing that we were interviewing someone, well, a couple podcasts ago, and they said that in the Olympics that the women were only doing half of the length of the men because they didn't think women could do the whole thing. Well, you guys are tearing up this course. [00:15:45] Speaker G: Exactly. [00:15:46] Speaker C: Yeah. [00:15:47] Speaker A: Demolishing 2K. Thank you guys so much. I know it's, like, busy regatta and, like, schedules are crazy and the weather. We weren't sure races got moved around. So thank you guys for making time to talk to us. This has been awesome. [00:16:00] Speaker D: Thank you. [00:16:02] Speaker E: Yeah, absolutely. [00:16:06] Speaker A: And now we have a rower from LaSalle who rode in the men's first varsity race just a few minutes ago. And I'm going to let him pronounce his name. I know him as Pele, but I don't want to pronounce his name wrong. He's one of our international students. So, Pele, why don't you first tell us who you are and your name, and then tell us a little bit about what you love the most about the La Salle team. [00:16:31] Speaker H: So my name is Predrag. It's kind of hard name to pronounce. I'm coming from Serbia. My nickname is Pele. As mentioned, I'm coming from Serbia. Belgrade. I rode at a club named Red Star. And I'm part of the La Salle men's driving team. [00:16:51] Speaker A: What do you love about La Salle? [00:16:53] Speaker H: That's, like, hard question. But what I love about La Salle is I love my team. I love my boys. I love the passion and I love the grit that everyone has. I love how everyone works hard every day to keep their spot, to show that we are better and better, that we are improving every day. Everyone is improving every day. And I love that everyone is so supportive. Everyone cares about each other. When someone is down, other boys come to pick him up, to support him. I also love coach. Coach plays a big role on our team. He is, like, basically our parent. And he also takes care about us. He loves us. And the amount of passion and dedication that he has for this team is incredible. And that's something that really makes me happy. And I just love that about my team the most. Like coach and just supporting us that we have. [00:17:50] Speaker C: So you mentioned your coach. Do you have a best piece of advice that a coach, this coach, or another coach has given you? [00:17:56] Speaker H: Yes. Yes. So I have a lot of advices from coaches. So one of the best advices I ever received from a coach is, so I race worlds. And right before a final, coach told me, told everyone, so if you want to win a gold, you're racing to break a world record. If you want to win a medal, you're racing for a gold. So having that in my head really pushed me, pushed me hard, really motivated me to push hard. And we ended up taking. Taking bronze medal, and we were racing for that gold to break a world record, to be the best crew out there. So that's definitely the best piece of advice my coach in Serbia gave me. And the best piece of advice that my coach, Eva, told me here is just like, so is just to, like, there is no, like, specific, like, advice like that, like the one before. But everything that he says to me personally is just to stay calm and stay clear in my head that I roll already the best, the best out of everyone. So just knowing that really motivates me. And that's the best possible advice he could have gave me. Just to stay calm in my mind and with my thoughts. [00:19:09] Speaker F: Yeah, that's great. So, I mean, being a rower is a long commitment. You've really fallen in love with it, obviously, and it's giving you a lot of what got you into rowing in the first place. [00:19:20] Speaker H: So I've been practicing rowing for, I think, 11 years now. So it was a long story, a long journey. And I was a little kid growing up, and I really wanted to become stronger and better. My dad used to be a rower and one of my neighbors, he was on the rowing team back in Serbia and Belgrade, part of the Red Star Roving Club. So he asked me if I wanted to join. My dad used to be a rover, as he said, and he was. He was pretty big and strong back in the days when he rode. So he was, you should join. You should. You should give it a shot, try to row. Those guys are fast, strong. And I was like, why not? So I showed up at a rowing club. I hopped in a single. I didn't know anything about rowing before, so I just. I didn't even go in the water. I was, like, kind of tied to a dock, and I was just, like, making strokes with my port oar. And I was like, oh, my God, this is so funny. This is great. I want to keep doing this. So day after day I showed up, and slowly I fell in love with the sport, and I love it. And it's now part of my. Part of my day is basically I row and I do this every day. And I don't feel like that's something that I have to do. That's something like. It's something like. It's like brushing my teeth. I just wake up and do it. That's it. [00:20:43] Speaker G: That's awesome. [00:20:45] Speaker F: Rowing is like brushing your teeth. [00:20:49] Speaker G: So you're an international rower here, rowing for a US team. How does that feel? Are there differences between rowing in Serbia and rowing United States, or how does it feel to be kind of representing the international community at LaSalle? [00:21:02] Speaker H: So it feels great. It feels great. It's definitely different. So the biggest difference here is that team is obviously bigger. Back in Serbia, I was around five to six guys, plus coach, so team was really small. And the reason behind that is just because robbing in Serbia is smaller than here. And all of the internationals, all of the internationals that are here, they try to. Like, everyone tries to come here because robbing is a big thing here. So first difference is a team here. We have 30 plus guys, and working with all of them is really, like. It's really hard. You have to. We're rowing the same in Serbia. We have completely different stroke than here. So adapting my stroke here was really hard for me. And I didn't want to do that at first because I was like, oh, why would I do that? I already know how to row. And then I slowly realized that if I don't adjust my rowing, we're never going to move fast. So that was the first thing that I Had to work on. And then second thing was food. Food was really hard for me to adjust. Coming from Europe, completely different food, and then having to adjust here, it was really hard. Like, the hardest thing was, like, everything here kind of tastes tasted sweet, so I couldn't eat at all. And bread was sweet. And I love how you call it chicken. Like drums. I don't even. Yeah. [00:22:37] Speaker A: Oh, yeah. [00:22:37] Speaker H: And I wanted to eat that at dining hall, and I grabbed a couple and that barbecue sauce was so sweet, and I couldn't eat it. And that was really hard to adjust. But other than that passion and the grit that my team has adjust me quickly. So it wasn't super hard to adjust, but also it was kind of hard. And especially language, that was also hard thing to get used to. I'm sorry if I didn't say something like, good, you've been great. [00:23:08] Speaker A: No, no, you've been great. [00:23:11] Speaker H: But, yeah, that was. That was the hard part, to adjust language. I didn't know English that good my freshman year, so kind of I had to practice it a lot. And now I'm here and I love it. I'm enjoying this every single day. I'm happy to show up to practice every morning. Yeah, that's wonderful. [00:23:29] Speaker A: Great. [00:23:29] Speaker F: Thank you. [00:23:29] Speaker A: Thank you so much. I do want to say one thing. Pele really just got off the water from the men's 1B final, and they brought home the bronze medal. I'm sure they wish they had brought home gold, but we're still super, super proud of you guys for bringing home bronze. [00:23:45] Speaker H: Thank you. Thank you so much. Thank you for having me. [00:23:49] Speaker I: My name is Wendy, and I'm here supporting my son at Drexel University. The best thing about being at Dadvale is just the people that you meet and just getting to support my child and the camaraderie and like, all the vendors that are here as well. I'm Lucy. I'm from Brock Rowing. And the best thing about rowing is the team environment and the culture that's around it. My name is Haley Knott. I'm from Brock Rowing. And the thing I love the most about our team is the grit that every person on our team has and then the shared quality time that we all spend together. I'm Sabrina from William Mary Club Rowing. And the best thing about race day is I really love sitting on the tarp in the tent waiting for your race. And then when you get off of your race, you can go eat all the food in the tent. And that is my favorite thing. I'm Sophia from William Mary Club Rowing. And my favorite thing about rowing is that it can be a team sport and it also could be a individual sport. It just matters, you know, what kind of boat you're put in. I'm in a double with Sabrina, and until then I've been in an eight. So it's really. It's really. Yeah. What you. What you make of it. [00:24:55] Speaker J: All right. My name is Henry from Temple Crew. I'd say I love nine and up against five other crews. And just racing down the course like head to head is just always so fun. My name is Grayson Bishop and I'm from Washington College. 2K. Love it or hate it? I definitely love the 2K. I feel like I really should hate it, but it's kind of all the sport is just really pushing it and whenever 2K comes around, it's just the best part about the sport, I think. My name is Corin Powell and I row for Drexel. My favorite thing about the team is I love our camaraderie, how we all cheering for each other. I mean, just now, all our eights raced. We've been cheering. All of us were down there at the lake. Cheer them on. [00:25:29] Speaker H: Billy Bush. I'm from Drexel. What I love most about the team [00:25:33] Speaker J: is that from the 1V to the [00:25:34] Speaker H: 6V, the depth is just insane. It doesn't matter what boat you're in. [00:25:38] Speaker J: Hi, my name is James Baer. I'm with Drexel. And I think the best thing about race day is the energy and the hype around it. Everybody's ready to go. Just so much fun.