Share with me your child’s experience rowing crew

[Anonymous]

For those who had a bad experience, it would be great to know which schools. Is it common knowledge that it’s a negative experience at your school?

[Anonymous]

Are most public school rowing teams no-cut or are there competitive tryouts?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Are most public school rowing teams no-cut or are there competitive tryouts?

Fcps schools are almost all no cut. The competition comes in which boat you make. Making the top few boats is cut throat.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Are most public school rowing teams no-cut or are there competitive tryouts?

Fcps schools are almost all no cut. The competition comes in which boat you make. Making the top few boats is cut throat.

It does get a little awkward if there's a hard to divide number, like 18 freshmen boys. 16 of them can make 2 freshmen 8s, but are the leftover 2 just doing dryland training all the time or are they cut? Otherwise it's pretty much no cut.

[Anonymous]

Downside of rowing: it feels like it should be really straightforward and boat assignments should be chosen by time. Except that time on an erg is very different from times on the water, and so many factors like needing ports vs. starboards and strokes come into play. My child has been part of two programs that both have messy political stuff when it comes to who is boated and in what boat. There can be a lot of stupid drama especially when it comes to who “deserves” to be in a boat. The drama of seniors who are slower than sophomores but whose parents expect them to get their “turn” at junior nationals or big travel regattas, people who are fast on an erg but dead on the water (+ vice versa), and coaches trying to find the right chemistry for a boat is really frustrating.

TLDR: thought it would be more similar to swimming or track, didn’t realize how complicated and frustrating it is to watch coaches put together eights and fours.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It’s a great sport for an average or non-athletic kid to pick up with an incredible work ethic. No one starts much before high school so it’s a very level playing field.

Incredibly time consuming and a lot of expectations from parents.

For serious rowing you need the tall and lean body type but doesn’t matter as much in high school.

This is the opposite of our experience with two boys. It was completely toxic.

Sure it's great at the beginning, but then it will become cutthroat, unless you're son is the coach's pet. They ignored injuries. They ignored individual erg scores/broke promises for placement.

If you play football, even if you're on the sidelines, you are more or less with the team. However, if you're not in the boat for practice, you're running on dry land with maybe one other kid.

We had two coaches and both were objectively terrible. Honestly, we told our BS troop leader about one incident and he said he'd never heard about such awful/unprofessional treatment in all his years.

Girls crew on the other hand, totally fine.

Girls crew was the same in our experience. Toxic from the top down and was that way for many rowers/families.

[Anonymous]

We have been blessed with a 100% non-toxic experience for DD at a FCPS program. She came to crew her sophomore season (probably would done freshman but for COVID chaos) after playing other sports growing up. She was a little behind, but was coachable and diligent and did fall club rowing to help catch up. Now as a senior she is on the 1V and has times that could get her on a college program. Yes, it's a lot of work, for both the kids and parents. In season she has either morning practice (5:30) or after school, where she isn't home until after 7:30.

[Anonymous]

My daughter just made her HS team as a freshman. She currently runs varsity XC and plays or has played a bunch of other sports, including soccer, basketball, flag football, field hockey, track and swim. She is athletic and a very hard worker but not tall, so we'll see how it goes. The practice schedule is intense - every day except Sunday. The expectations for parent involvement are intense and it's an expensive sport.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Please include details on how/when to begin, time commitment, community, and any knowledge of competitive crew in the DMV

For schools in the DMV…NCS, STA, Gonzaga field 8 person varsity. SJC and some others field 2 and 4 person boats.

Jackson-Reed, Whitman and BCC for public schools field 8 person boys and girls varsity.

There are probably others, but those are prominent in the DMV. I believe all of the above schools send both boys and girls to D1 rowing programs, as well as D3.

High school rowing actually started in the 1940s at Alexandria’s GW HS and Arlington’s W-L HS. It’s one of the oldest sports here in the DMV. Most area public schools and private schools now have rowing teams and the larger public schools and many private schools have varsity 8 boats. Only Alexandria and Arlington public schools (and the private schools) support crew with some amount of financial assistance and official sponsorship as a varsity sport. It is a club sport at most other schools due largely due to its expense. We are lucky to have so many schools here with rowing programs.

[Anonymous]

As toxic as they come

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Please include details on how/when to begin, time commitment, community, and any knowledge of competitive crew in the DMV

For schools in the DMV…NCS, STA, Gonzaga field 8 person varsity. SJC and some others field 2 and 4 person boats.

Jackson-Reed, Whitman and BCC for public schools field 8 person boys and girls varsity.

There are probably others, but those are prominent in the DMV. I believe all of the above schools send both boys and girls to D1 rowing programs, as well as D3.

High school rowing actually started in the 1940s at Alexandria’s GW HS and Arlington’s W-L HS. It’s one of the oldest sports here in the DMV. Most area public schools and private schools now have rowing teams and the larger public schools and many private schools have varsity 8 boats. Only Alexandria and Arlington public schools (and the private schools) support crew with some amount of financial assistance and official sponsorship as a varsity sport. It is a club sport at most other schools due largely due to its expense. We are lucky to have so many schools here with rowing programs.

It is a varsity sport, but not provided with any funding at 14 FCPS high schools.

[Anonymous]

Does anyone here have experience to share for rowing through any of the APS high schools?

[Anonymous]

We had major issues with both leadership and coaching toxicity. We had to involve SafeSport and many people advised us to hire lawyers.

Our son is now in high school and loves being on the water, so we're driving him to a different club, about an hour away. I'm hopeful that this club is less toxic, but only time will tell.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Does anyone here have experience to share for rowing through any of the APS high schools?

Yes. Wakefield has built a program that’s been successful at the state and national level in recent years.

https://www.gazetteleader.com/arlington/sports/wakefield-girls-boys-crew-teams-enjoy-most-successful-seasons-9043136

[Anonymous]

Poop