rowing

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Recruiting aside, it is worth mentioning that many clubs allow dedicated walk ons. A friend’s reasonably tall son was an academic admit at Bowdoin. To bridge the purported narp/athlete divide, he showed up for the rowing info session and joined the team. He’s actually decent, does not feel the pressure to perform that the recruited kids feels, and now has friends in all sorts of groups on campus. Don’t underestimate the opportunity to walk on D3. This option is for hard workers only. It’s less transactional than recruiting, and can lead to a deep sense of satisfaction and discipline.

There are enough people who love and promote the sport for lifelong fitness, the relationship to the water, the ability to be part of a team in perfect sync and the friendships that grow from the time together that it takes to achieve that state.

The sport only benefits as more people become interested. The elite pathways are well worn, but many programs take newcomers.

(Finally, I will share that I had a private laugh when reading the recent angsty posts from parents of daughters worrying about how were they ever to find a tall mate, from a pedigreed family, who attend(s/ed) an elite university? Well, there are usually about 60 of them in one location at the same time everyday on campus. On many campuses, in fact. Start there, ladies. Start there.)

Guessing the OP does not actually care abut the rowing part but is looking for an admissions boost

OP here — I do care about the sport. As I mentioned my child is pretty athletic and plays another sport (that is also very expensive and very hard to play in college even at D3 level), so I was wondering about having her switch and if it’s too late. She does happen to be tall and her sport requires running around the court so could translate well to rowing.

Have her join a local rowing club. They can teach the basics and she can figure out if she likes it or not. Some D1 progams even have walk on programs. Take a look at Ohio State.

https://ohiostatebuckeyes.com/sports/2018/7/17/walk-on-rowing

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We have a friend who is rowing recruit for a NESCAC school. Had other D3 options that people on this forum would kill for. He knew early on where he was going.

The NESCAC pretty much owns D3 rowing.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:A lot of people posting here have no idea what they're talking about. My daughter was recruited for lightweight rowing to Princeton. That means she had to weigh in at under 130 pounds...for boy lightweights 160 pounds. Heavy weight boys have no weight limit nor do "open weight" girls.

Mine started rowing after 7th grade in a summer program. She went to a private school here. There were some kids on her summer team from BCC and Whitman who were recruited...one was a cox recruit at Harvard. When daughter was being recruited, we bought some books about recruiting from Amazon. They were very helpful. I just googled to find some free information about the recruitment process for rowing:
https://crewconnection.squarespace.com/recruiting-101/college-recruiting-101. In addition to summer rowing for club team, daughter rowed for HS team. Not for the faint of heart, but she loved it. It is true that it is easier for girls to be recruited than boys. That is because of Title 9. Schools have to balance numbers of girl sport recruits to boys. So since there are bigger boy teams such as football, baseball, etc., that doesn't leave slots for boy rowers.

AMA - daughter loved HS + college rowing. She left college rowing after 2 years because of injuries from other sports.

130 lbs for girls does not equal 160 pounds for boys. I know those are the weights, but they shouldn’t be.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I know a girl who switched to crew in 11th and was recruited. From a public school, believe it or not.

She must have switched when school began in 11th or shortly after. She would need a racing history to show to coaches. Unless it's a lower ranked school. Some of those lower ranked D1 schools will take even non-rowers who merely submit a strong erg score.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:A lot of people posting here have no idea what they're talking about. My daughter was recruited for lightweight rowing to Princeton. That means she had to weigh in at under 130 pounds...for boy lightweights 160 pounds. Heavy weight boys have no weight limit nor do "open weight" girls.

Mine started rowing after 7th grade in a summer program. She went to a private school here. There were some kids on her summer team from BCC and Whitman who were recruited...one was a cox recruit at Harvard. When daughter was being recruited, we bought some books about recruiting from Amazon. They were very helpful. I just googled to find some free information about the recruitment process for rowing:
https://crewconnection.squarespace.com/recruiting-101/college-recruiting-101. In addition to summer rowing for club team, daughter rowed for HS team. Not for the faint of heart, but she loved it. It is true that it is easier for girls to be recruited than boys. That is because of Title 9. Schools have to balance numbers of girl sport recruits to boys. So since there are bigger boy teams such as football, baseball, etc., that doesn't leave slots for boy rowers.

AMA - daughter loved HS + college rowing. She left college rowing after 2 years because of injuries from other sports.

How tall are lightweight rowers, usually? Did you or she worry about weight gain in college? I’d hate to have a kid focusing on maintaining weight for any sport.

Bummer she got injured, what else did she play?

Was she always a morning person?

My daughter is 5'7" " inches. It was hard to weigh in below 130 because rowers are very muscular. She got injured doing a marathon. She was also recruited for D1 Ivy Field Hockey. But rowing is a 2 season sport fall & summer, so she couldn't do FH. She preferred rowing. She was never a morning person to answer your question, so luckily most of her practices were after classes. Rowing is very hard work and people LOVE it!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:A lot of people posting here have no idea what they're talking about. My daughter was recruited for lightweight rowing to Princeton. That means she had to weigh in at under 130 pounds...for boy lightweights 160 pounds. Heavy weight boys have no weight limit nor do "open weight" girls.

Mine started rowing after 7th grade in a summer program. She went to a private school here. There were some kids on her summer team from BCC and Whitman who were recruited...one was a cox recruit at Harvard. When daughter was being recruited, we bought some books about recruiting from Amazon. They were very helpful. I just googled to find some free information about the recruitment process for rowing:
https://crewconnection.squarespace.com/recruiting-101/college-recruiting-101. In addition to summer rowing for club team, daughter rowed for HS team. Not for the faint of heart, but she loved it. It is true that it is easier for girls to be recruited than boys. That is because of Title 9. Schools have to balance numbers of girl sport recruits to boys. So since there are bigger boy teams such as football, baseball, etc., that doesn't leave slots for boy rowers.

AMA - daughter loved HS + college rowing. She left college rowing after 2 years because of injuries from other sports.

How tall are lightweight rowers, usually? Did you or she worry about weight gain in college? I’d hate to have a kid focusing on maintaining weight for any sport.

Bummer she got injured, what else did she play?

Was she always a morning person?

My daughter is 5'7" " inches. It was hard to weigh in below 130 because rowers are very muscular. She got injured doing a marathon. She was also recruited for D1 Ivy Field Hockey. But rowing is a 2 season sport fall & summer, so she couldn't do FH. She preferred rowing. She was never a morning person to answer your question, so luckily most of her practices were after classes. Rowing is very hard work and people LOVE it!

Yes, being 5'7"-5'8" and under 130 with a very top erg time is a unicorn body type. The few I know who had it were phenomenal runners. Jackson Reed had two within the past half dozen years (one went on to row lightweight at Harvard and one at Stanford) and both were the very top cross country runner in DC when they were solely running. That's the level of fitness that they were capable of with relative ease. They weren't girls who went from recreational athlete to elite lightweight rower.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:A lot of people posting here have no idea what they're talking about. My daughter was recruited for lightweight rowing to Princeton. That means she had to weigh in at under 130 pounds...for boy lightweights 160 pounds. Heavy weight boys have no weight limit nor do "open weight" girls.

Mine started rowing after 7th grade in a summer program. She went to a private school here. There were some kids on her summer team from BCC and Whitman who were recruited...one was a cox recruit at Harvard. When daughter was being recruited, we bought some books about recruiting from Amazon. They were very helpful. I just googled to find some free information about the recruitment process for rowing:
https://crewconnection.squarespace.com/recruiting-101/college-recruiting-101. In addition to summer rowing for club team, daughter rowed for HS team. Not for the faint of heart, but she loved it. It is true that it is easier for girls to be recruited than boys. That is because of Title 9. Schools have to balance numbers of girl sport recruits to boys. So since there are bigger boy teams such as football, baseball, etc., that doesn't leave slots for boy rowers.

AMA - daughter loved HS + college rowing. She left college rowing after 2 years because of injuries from other sports.

How tall are lightweight rowers, usually? Did you or she worry about weight gain in college? I’d hate to have a kid focusing on maintaining weight for any sport.

Bummer she got injured, what else did she play?

Was she always a morning person?

My daughter is 5'7" " inches. It was hard to weigh in below 130 because rowers are very muscular. She got injured doing a marathon. She was also recruited for D1 Ivy Field Hockey. But rowing is a 2 season sport fall & summer, so she couldn't do FH. She preferred rowing. She was never a morning person to answer your question, so luckily most of her practices were after classes. Rowing is very hard work and people LOVE it!

Yes, being 5'7"-5'8" and under 130 with a very top erg time is a unicorn body type. The few I know who had it were phenomenal runners. Jackson Reed had two within the past half dozen years (one went on to row lightweight at Harvard and one at Stanford) and both were the very top cross country runner in DC when they were solely running. That's the level of fitness that they were capable of with relative ease. They weren't girls who went from recreational athlete to elite lightweight rower.

Good point...most rowers have excelled at another sport which rowing coaches love.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The HYP recruits are 5'8" up as girls (many close to 6'), 6'3" up as guys.

Wait - this 5’8”+ (girls) / 6’3”+ (boys) is really unfair!

How are colleges getting away with this?

It's not unfair. That is the body type that tends to do well with crew.

There are exceptions, but a long, lean body type lends itself well to crew. Honestly, work ethic has a lot to do with it as well.

That seems extremely ableist.

Please. I'm a female, 5'10" and slender. What are the odds of my being a gymnast?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP, get her to try out the sport. It's very different from a sport that requires running a lot. It's primarily a strength sport where short bursts of intense endurance is required. The recruiting angle is very much dependent on the erg times. It's just not possible without an extremely competitive erg time because you'll be blown out of the water with int'l athletes or within the transfer portal. So before giving up a sport she's good at (and could potentially be recruited for), I'd see how well she stacks with strength. She has a long runway if she's in 8th grade but you have to be able to develop strength.

Also, I don't think you can just row for a high school team and think that will get you recruited to top schools. High school rowing typically has winter conditioning and a spring season where they perform at a set number of regattas. That's honestly not what top schools are looking for in a recruited rower. They want to see the year around training and regatta experience. That's why the elite private schools have an advantage. But ultimately, you'll primarily be judged on your erg metric. It's the only way to tell who on a 1V boat is getting the job done.

Thank you for this information. What if rowing is not offered at DC's school but DC is active year-round at one of the local clubs? Would that be a significant disadvantage for getting recruited to college for rowing compared to the kid who also has a high school rowing team?

You have no choice if rowing isn't offered at DC's school and your hope is to get her into a recruited spot at a DI or DIII--you'll have to go with the local club. Assuming that the local club has a healthy schedule of year around regattas and your child is able to build her erg times to be a competitive recruit, it really should not matter. My earlier point was to not rely just on a local public school program. Most kids from local public schools supplement their winter/spring with their public school by adding fall/summer with a club.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We have a friend who is rowing recruit for a NESCAC school. Had other D3 options that people on this forum would kill for. He knew early on where he was going.

the only D3 option that people on this forum would kill for is Williams -

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We have a friend who is rowing recruit for a NESCAC school. Had other D3 options that people on this forum would kill for. He knew early on where he was going.

the only D3 option that people on this forum would kill for is Williams -

I think people are forgetting that crew teams (rowers+coxswains) aren't treated like regular athletes. Academics are super important for this sport. It's the sport that helps the other athlete groups bring up their GPA stats. Coaches are looking to admit you first based on your academic strength and then your erg strength. Many "athletic counseling firms" help int'l students with their academic profile first for entry into a rowing program in the US in the elite D1/D3 schools.

[Anonymous]

Also people get confused by MIT. It is D3 in all sport, except rowing, where they compete D1.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:A lot of people posting here have no idea what they're talking about. My daughter was recruited for lightweight rowing to Princeton. That means she had to weigh in at under 130 pounds...for boy lightweights 160 pounds. Heavy weight boys have no weight limit nor do "open weight" girls.

Mine started rowing after 7th grade in a summer program. She went to a private school here. There were some kids on her summer team from BCC and Whitman who were recruited...one was a cox recruit at Harvard. When daughter was being recruited, we bought some books about recruiting from Amazon. They were very helpful. I just googled to find some free information about the recruitment process for rowing:
https://crewconnection.squarespace.com/recruiting-101/college-recruiting-101. In addition to summer rowing for club team, daughter rowed for HS team. Not for the faint of heart, but she loved it. It is true that it is easier for girls to be recruited than boys. That is because of Title 9. Schools have to balance numbers of girl sport recruits to boys. So since there are bigger boy teams such as football, baseball, etc., that doesn't leave slots for boy rowers.

AMA - daughter loved HS + college rowing. She left college rowing after 2 years because of injuries from other sports.

How tall are lightweight rowers, usually? Did you or she worry about weight gain in college? I’d hate to have a kid focusing on maintaining weight for any sport.

Bummer she got injured, what else did she play?

Was she always a morning person?

My daughter is 5'7" " inches. It was hard to weigh in below 130 because rowers are very muscular. She got injured doing a marathon. She was also recruited for D1 Ivy Field Hockey. But rowing is a 2 season sport fall & summer, so she couldn't do FH. She preferred rowing. She was never a morning person to answer your question, so luckily most of her practices were after classes. Rowing is very hard work and people LOVE it!

Then she does not have an ideal body type for rowing. It is comparatively much harder for a 6’1 man to be under 160 (I think it is 165 as the limit), but they do it. They have to have the right body type though.

My point was only that is should be 120-160 or 130-170. Perhaps even 135-175 - not sure.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:A lot of people posting here have no idea what they're talking about. My daughter was recruited for lightweight rowing to Princeton. That means she had to weigh in at under 130 pounds...for boy lightweights 160 pounds. Heavy weight boys have no weight limit nor do "open weight" girls.

Mine started rowing after 7th grade in a summer program. She went to a private school here. There were some kids on her summer team from BCC and Whitman who were recruited...one was a cox recruit at Harvard. When daughter was being recruited, we bought some books about recruiting from Amazon. They were very helpful. I just googled to find some free information about the recruitment process for rowing:
https://crewconnection.squarespace.com/recruiting-101/college-recruiting-101. In addition to summer rowing for club team, daughter rowed for HS team. Not for the faint of heart, but she loved it. It is true that it is easier for girls to be recruited than boys. That is because of Title 9. Schools have to balance numbers of girl sport recruits to boys. So since there are bigger boy teams such as football, baseball, etc., that doesn't leave slots for boy rowers.

AMA - daughter loved HS + college rowing. She left college rowing after 2 years because of injuries from other sports.

How tall are lightweight rowers, usually? Did you or she worry about weight gain in college? I’d hate to have a kid focusing on maintaining weight for any sport.

Bummer she got injured, what else did she play?

Was she always a morning person?

My daughter is 5'7" " inches. It was hard to weigh in below 130 because rowers are very muscular. She got injured doing a marathon. She was also recruited for D1 Ivy Field Hockey. But rowing is a 2 season sport fall & summer, so she couldn't do FH. She preferred rowing. She was never a morning person to answer your question, so luckily most of her practices were after classes. Rowing is very hard work and people LOVE it!

Then she does not have an ideal body type for rowing. It is comparatively much harder for a 6’1 man to be under 160 (I think it is 165 as the limit), but they do it. They have to have the right body type though.

My point was only that is should be 120-160 or 130-170. Perhaps even 135-175 - not sure.

You don't seem to understand lightweight rowers vs. " heavyweight men" + "open weight" women. People have "ideal" weights for whatever their weight class... Like different weight classes for wrestling. * Note they don't call women " heavyweights" like they do men..they call women rowing over 130 pound lights " openweights" so they don't think they're fat.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Not too late. Kids at our public get into HYP for rowing, and started in 8th/9th. Being tall helps!

So this doesn't happen.

Most rowers are from top privates with few from public schools. There are a few public school exceptions for kids from some wealthy NY/CT (or CA) suburbs who rowed at elite clubs. Rowing is the ultimate white DEI sport.
Most recruited rowers at HYP are European and competitive at the national level.
Being tall doesn't just help, it is a prerequisite. 6'2" for men and 5'10" for women except for coxswains (who typically do not receive recruiting support).

Overall rowing is not by any means a easier path to admittance to a top school.

Most recruited HYP rowers are American, being tall is not a prerequisite (but it helps), no idea what 'white DEI sport' means', coxswains absolutely receive recruiting support, elite programs recruit more rowers from DC public schools than DC privates.

Apart from that, absolutely spot on.