University of Minnesota Athletics
Novice Rowers Set for First Competition
3/31/2016 12:00:00 AM | Rowing
After a fall full of learning the basics and a winter full of preparation, the University of Minnesota's novice rowing team is ready for their first look at spring action at the San Diego Crew Classic.
During the offseason, the novices traveled to San Diego in January and February to train and scrimmage the University of San Diego. The focus of the trip was getting building boat chemistry with each other, according to novice coach Claudia Herpertz.
"Racing-wise, they were definitely not on the same page yet," Herpertz said. "But they definitely took some really good steps especially because they haven't been on the water all winter long."
When the team arrived back in Minneapolis, they were able to get back on the water for a short amount of time before the river froze over again. The team stayed hard at work inside with erging and weightlifting before traveling to California to scrimmage Sacramento State at the end of February.
"Definitely had a very solid couple piece; we definitely dominated that one compared to San Diego which was really good to see," Herpertz said.
Going into this weekend's competition, Herpertz has seen the novices come together and improve in the technical aspects of rowing.
The Gophers will send one boat to the San Diego Crew Classic where they will race twice, once on Saturday and once on Sunday. The race will be six boats across, which the novice rowers have never done.
"We are not going to have six or seven boats across until Big Tens so even having that experience for the rowers is really big and will hopefully give us a really big advantage early on compared to other Big Ten schools who may not have that," Herpertz explained.
Besides the Gophers, the field is comprised entirely of West Coast schools, who have been out on the water all winter long. Regardless, Herpertz is excited to see how the lone Big Ten boat competes in their first competition.
"I'm just telling them to control what you have control over. I'm excited to see how it turns out," she said.
