11/19/2006

Hello Tulsa Women’s Rowing Fans,

The Golden Hurricane is getting faster!  This weekend your rowing team went Wichita, KS for the Frostbite Regatta and returned with 1^st place medals in all of its Varsity events.  In fact, in three events TU placed 1^st and 2^nd to hold the two top finishes.  The novice crew also had a very strong showing in its first race of the season earning a bronze medal and a fourth place.

In an effort to be brief in my e-letters, I have omitted some details.  You can always find out more by accessing our website at http://www.tulsahurricane.com.  You can also hear audio interviews on the website by going to “Tulsa All Access”.  You will need to get a password but there is no charge to hear the rowing interviews.

Coach Julie Domina, our new novice coach, has done an excellent job with her team this fall.  She has a very motivated group of women who also happen to be pretty good athletes. They all seem to be very motivated to do well and are great contributors to the team as a whole.  Novices, by the way, are women who just joined the team this year and have taken their first strokes as varsity rowers at TU.  Rowing is a very unique sport in that our walk-ons are the life blood of our sport because so few high schools sponsor rowing in the United States.  The women on our team are a great reflection of the TU student body.  Three of our freshmen are even Presidential Scholars at TU.  Smart and athletic- it’s a great combination.

We entered two Novice 4+’s and a Novice 8.  The Novice 4A and Novice 8 were both coxed by freshman Megan Wells (Sapulpa, OK) and the Novice 4B was coxed by junior Leslie Sanditen (Tulsa, OK).  Both of these coxswains had great races with TU finishing with a 3^rd and 8^th place standing in the Novice 4+ out of 16 boats.  The Novice 8 finished 4^th out of 8 boats entered.  It was a great first effort for them and some would return later in the day to race with the varsity.

The fact that we have moved our rowing practices to Catoosa has greatly improved our fitness and speed.  Our small boats dominated the regatta this weekend.  Freshman Aidan Leddy (Georgetown, TX) jumped into the Women’s Open 1x and finished with a bronze medal.  It would have been silver except for a “mysterious” buoy penalty that no one could explain.  Like many of our women, Aidan would literally race, row to the dock, and hop into the boat for their next race.  Our improvements in fitness have allowed us to be successful competing that way.

This was shown by two significant finishes in the Women’s Double and the Women’s Pair.  TU entered 3 boats in the pair.  The “A” pair was rowed by juniors Angela Rozowski-Vogt and Michelle Sechser.  The “B” pair was rowed by senior co-captain Monika Burton and sophomore Allie Bridge.  The “C” pair was rowed by juniors Brianna Palmer and Shara Derks.  They finished 1^st, 2^nd and 5^th in a strong field of 8 boats.  That was even a better result than it sounds because we have spent so little time in pair boats this fall.

We also had great finishes in our 4’s racing.  In the Open 4+ race we entered a record 5 boats lettered “A” through “E”.  The boats were coxed by sophomore Nicole Falvo (Saratoga Springs, NY), senior co-captain Julie Burch (Collinsville, OK), senior Gabriela Lopez (Broken Arrow, OK), junior Danielle Guccione (Dallas, TX), and novice junior Leslie Sanditen (Tulsa, OK).  We did some special things in this event this year, the first being the fact that we raced 5 boats.  Many of you will recognize Danny Guccione as a lightweight rower.  While she was in prep school in England she also coxed and she volunteered to help us out a little with racing this fall.  Also, Leslie Sanditen, as a novice coxswain, was able to steer her first varsity event which allowed us to get our 5^th four on the water.  Finally, our “A” and “C” boats were the Club 4+  and Lightweight 4+ that raced in Boston while “B” 4+ was the 2005 Championship 4+.  Since we let the rowers pick some of their line-ups, the “B” boat wanted to see if they still had enough speed to win the event.  Turns out they did!

There were 19 boats entered in the 4’s event.  The TU women dominated it with the “B” boat finishing 1^st and the “A” boat finishing 2^nd about 5 seconds back from “A”.  The Lightweights finished 4^th and probably could have slipped into the 3^rd spot but were so far back in traffic that they were slowed down a bit by the other crews.  This also was the case with the “D” and “E” boats that finished 7^th and 11^th respectively.  It was great to have all of the boats basically in the top half of that competition and it was especially fun to see us take the top 2 spots.  It was also good to see the rowers competing within the team to see who can be fastest.  That is a new phenomena here and it can only help us as we seek to beat crews this spring!

The Lightweight 4+ would also get to shine in its own event later in the day.  The Lightweight 4+ would win their event by 25 seconds over its nearest competitor.  They are rowing very strongly and I think will be a very good boat for the rowing team in the spring.

The last event that TU entered was the 8.  Nicole Falvo coxed a boat made up totally of women in our junior class and stroked by Angela Rozowski-Vogt as the “A” boat.  Julie Burch took a more mixed boat of women in the “B” boat with sophomore Allie Bridge (Mathews, VA) stroking.  Gabriela Lopez had the “C” boat which we filled with walk-on and recruited freshmen.  That boat was stroked by Casey Stellato (Saratoga Springs, NY).

We were basically looking for revenge.  In last year’s race, Washington University (MO) had beaten our crew.  Even though the line-ups then were not what our boats would look like in the spring, our crews took that very personally.  Our junior class is also beginning to feel their oats and, along with the seniors, is working to lead our program in a way that has not been done previously.  Therefore when the juniors saw that Wash U. was starting just ahead of them, it was like a red flag to a bull.  They came after Wash U. with everything they had, catching up to them in the “no passing zone” just before the last bridge.  The fact that the course in Wichita is so short (1.7 miles versus the normal 3 mile distance) and the no passing zones, I am pretty certain that TU would have passed Wash U. and pushed ahead for more.  The “B” would have been a part of that but were caught up in traffic in the “no passing zone”.  Julie wanted to get around Nebraska and Oklahoma but was restricted and had to come off the pressure for almost 30 seconds instead.  If she had followed instinct and passed them, she would have been penalized as much as 1 minute by the referees.   As it was they finished 4^th, 16 seconds behind third.  It was all a little frustrating but still a well rowed race by Julie’s boat.  The “C” also had a good finish in 8^th place.  That boat rowed with three new rowers in it to round out the freshman class.  Maris Weston, Hannah Grafe, and Susan Stangl did an awesome job in their first race with their varsity teammates.  Nice job!

After a good fall season, the Golden Hurricane Rowers will come off the water until winter camp.  This is what we call our “8-Hour” period.  It allows the student-athletes to cut down on their sort commitments and concentrate a little harder on school.  The women will be doing winter camp here in Tulsa from December 14-21, 2006.  This is possible because the structure of the new boathouse should be completed by then.  Why go to Austin when you have 18 miles of water here in Tulsa.  Anyway, pray for good weather here for your rowers!

I hope everyone enjoys the pictures.  Bruce Howard, who many of you will recognize as the “Voice of the Golden Hurricane”, sent along a video clip as well.  Please look for donation flyers for Row for Humanity in the coming weeks.  I am sure that we’ll be sending out another e-letter before the Christmas holiday.  Until then, I wish you calm waters and good rowing!