Fritz Hagerman Wins the 2013 Jack Kelly Award

Dr. Fritz Hagerman. Photo: USRowing

On 29 October U.S.Rowing announced the winner of this year’s Jack Kelly Award: Dr. Fritz Hagerman. Sadly, the following day, 30 October, Dr. Hagerman passed away. Read his obituary here. On the 29th USRowing wrote,

Not long after the United States men’s eight qualified for the final spot in the London Olympic Games, men’s coach Mike Teti called on an old friend to come in and help him figure out how he could make his team go faster. This expert on rowers was not there to tell Teti how his crew was rowing or what kind of changes they could make in the boat to improve. But he could tell Teti a few things about his athletes – like how much lactic acid they produced during a piece, what their body fat percentages were, the rates at which they consumed oxygen and what they could do to get better before Olympic competition.

It’s the kind of information that Teti has been getting from Dr. Fritz Hagerman for every U.S. team Teti has coached, or has ever been on. Hagerman, an emeritus professor of physiology in the department of biomedical sciences at the Heritage College of Osteopathic Medicine at Ohio University, has worked with the U.S. National Team since 1972 and crunched the same kinds of numbers through ten Olympic Games.

For his work and commitment to rowing, Hagerman has been awarded the 2013 Jack Kelly Award, given annually to recognize superior achievements in rowing, service to amateur athletics and success in a chosen profession and honors a person who serves as an inspiration to American rowers. Hagerman will be [would have been] honored at the 2013 Golden Oars Awards Dinner on 20 November in New York City.

“I’m very, very impressed,” Hagerman said. “Considering I’ve never taken a stroke, I’m pleased and honored to be named among all the others that have come before me. [The dinner] will be a good time for me to see old friends. This is exciting.”

For Teti, it is also exciting. Over the years, he has been pricked, biopsied and measured by Hagerman “more than anyone else” and had him do the same for his athletes. The results have helped Teti develop training plans suited to the athletes.

“We would test about three times,” Teti said. “The first test would generally be in the late fall and by the results of that, we would gauge the training up through the winter and the early spring. We would test again in the spring, and then we would always do another test in the summer once the team was selected with six weeks to go. And the thing that was great about Fritz, for me, was a lot of that information I really didn’t understand and Fritz was able to put it in layman’s terms and sort of explain it to me in basics. Like, we need to add another aerobic threshold workout or we should do a little bit more transportation work.”

Their bond grew so much from their time together that Hagerman served as a groomsman in Teti’s wedding in 2001.

“I love the guy,” Teti said. “He cares. Fritz cares. He’s passionate and he cares. He cares about those guys and he cares about all those athletes.”

One moment in particular stands out for Teti that demonstrates Hagerman’s passion for what he does. Teti’s men’s eight had won the world championship in 1997 and 1998, and had made the final again in 1999. Teti had some concerns about the race and he asked Hagerman to speak to the team before they raced.

“So Fritz gave them this pre-race talk before the final. We got out to a lead, but the outside lanes were sort of favored, so the British went through us in the middle of the race and then in the end we had this furious sprint and came back through them. I’m watching the race on the big screen in the press tent. We won, and I’m running out of the tent cheering and I see this guy running towards me. It’s Fritz, and there is all this white stuff hanging out of his ears,” Teti said.

“He gives me this hug and he’s crying. Tears are streaming down his face. He gave these guys this pre-race talk and he was so nervous, he went up into a bathroom. He didn’t want to hear the race. He couldn’t watch it. So he shoved toilet paper in his ears so he couldn’t hear. When they won, he comes down and he sees that they won, and he had tears streaming down his face. That shows someone that cares. He loves those guys. They love him. He’s straight up with them. He gives useful information,” Teti said. “He’s one of those guys that I wish I could be like. I don’t know how he can be so upbeat, so positive and always be right.”

Hagerman said his work in rowing began in the 1960s in New Zealand when he was teaching medical school there. New Zealand rowing asked him to help them “develop a team concept,” for selection and training of their athletes. He tested their athletes to determine their capabilities for physical performance, measuring oxygen consumption and the level of lactate each rower produced during various workouts. The information was used not only to help select the best possible athletes, but to help the coaches develop training plans based on the results.

“I didn’t know anything about rowing, nothing,” Hagerman said. “We started putting things together and it seemed to have worked.” While Hagerman formally began working with the U.S. National Team leading up to the 1972 Olympic Games, Teti said he was involved in testing for the Penn coxed four that competed in the 1968 Olympic Games in Mexico City.  Since 1972, Hagerman has tested the majority of the U.S. athletes who have rowed at the world championships and Olympic Games.

“Over the past 40 years, there is not a national team or Olympic team that Fritz has not helped. U.S. coaches and athletes have come and gone since 1972, but Fritz has been a constant. Fritz’s passion for and dedication to USRowing, its athletes and coaches is unparalleled,” said Curtis Jordan, USRowing High Performance Director.

The award is named after Jack Kelly, a four-time Olympian (bronze in the single sculls in 1956) from Philadelphia, who was the son of John B. Kelly, Sr., an Olympic champion in the single sculls in 1920 and two-time champion in the double sculls in 1920 and 1924 (both times with his cousin, Paul Costello). In 1920, Kelly Sr., was denied to enter the Diamond Challenge Sculls, the single sculls event at Henley Royal Regatta, because of two reasons: he had worked as a brick-layer and the Henley Stewards had put a ban on rowers from Vesper Boat Club since they had “misbehaved” at an earlier regatta. His son, Kelly, Jr., entered the Diamonds in 1946, 1947 and 1949, winning the Cup in 1947 and 1949.

Meeting Sarah Trowbridge

Last Saturday, Sarah Trowbridge, a 2012 U.S. Olympian who competed in the women's double sculls, gave a talk at the La Grua Center in Stonington, Connecticut. Sarah, who went to high school in Guilford, Connecticut, began to row her senior year at The Blood Street Sculls (Old Lyme) after having tried every other sport there is, more or less. Wanting to continue to row, she picked a college with a great rowing programme, University of Michigan. After graduating, she moved to Washington D.C., joined the Potomac Boat Club and started to practise hard to be able to go to Princeton, where the women's national team is training. 

With her 5’8”, Sarah might not have been among the first ones to be selected for the women's eight, and when she got picked it was for the sculling boats. Her first great victory came in the double sculls at the 2007 Pan American Games, where she also took a silver in the quadruple sculls. The following year, she raced in the four and took a silver both in the senior and junior world championships.

Sarah was happy to talk and share her story with the more than 100 people gathered in the big room at the La Grua Center. Her story invited us to laugh as it was a good tale she was telling, but there were also unhappy and difficult moments when she did not get elected at first, and at one point she more or less invited herself to Princeton when it seemed the coach "forgot" to invite her. Between 2007 and 2012, she made six national teams, the highlight being the 2012 London Games, where she and Margot Shumway placed sixth in the final of the double sculls. You will find her other results here. Currently, Sarah is acting as assistant coach at Yale.

Unfortunately, there was no time for HTBS to chat with Sarah after the talk, but when asked to comment about the women's Scullers Super Eight, who had won at HOCR a week ago, Sarah thought it was an amazing achievement that was the real buzz in Boston after the regatta.

Tricks and Racket...?

The Board of USRowing has now announces the results of the 2013 Election Investigation which was launched after finding ‘irregular voting patterns in the Mid-Atlantic’ USRowing writes on its website. Read the whole statement here.

Rowing Designer Jake Mercuri Wins Row to Rio Logo Contest

The other day, USRowing announced that Jake Mercuri is the winner of the Row to Rio logo contest. Mercuri’s logo was selected from over 120 entries through online voting and final selection committee nominations.

Chief Marketing Officer of USRowing, Beth Kohl, says in a press release ‘In choosing Jake Mercuri’s design, the committee loved the strong commitment to Rio depicted through the choice of the Brazilian colors and the flag, while incorporating the USA oars.’ The logo will be included in all aspects of USRowing and the National Rowing Foundation’s Row to Rio campaign, which Kohl said is designed to energize the rowing community to support the team training for Rio.

Read an interview with Mercuri on USRowing’s website here.

Rowing in the Cold

Two days ago, USRowing's website published a good article how to dress if you are out rowing or sculling in cold weather. Needless to say, if you are out sculling on your own, don't flip the boat! Read the article here.

Grace, Grit and Glory...

Richard Butler, who is USRowing’s Inclusion Manager, writes and discusses hot topics related to diversity in rowing in a blog on USRowing’s website. Yesterday’s post had the title: “Grace, Grit and Glory – A Celebration of Women in Rowing” which also was the title for an event organised by Community Rowing, Inc.’ Read his blog post here, and do not forget to go to Facebook to check out some pictures from the event, here.

RowLA is the 2012 USRowing Anita DeFrantz Award Winner

In a press release USRowing writes:

Four years ago, a group of women masters rowers launching their boats from a small beach at the bottom of an arena in Marina Del Ray, California, felt that there was a need to bring rowing to girls from the underserved neighborhoods of Los Angeles. 

So they started RowLA and the other day, USRowing announced that the program that now teaches the sport to more than 100 Los Angeles-area teens and assists them with school and college applications has been named the 2012 Anita DeFrantz Award recipient. 

Introduced last year, the award is given annually to honor leaders in diversity and inclusion. The award will be presented at the Golden Oars Awards Dinner on Wednesday, November 14, at the New York Athletic Club in New York City.



“We are thrilled, really thrilled to receive the award,” said Liz Greenberger, who along with Erin Berman and Debra Shaw founded and now direct the program. “We had felt for a number of years that Los Angeles needed to open up rowing to the community at large and to girls from underserved neighborhoods who had fewer sports to chose from and fewer resources in their school’s athletic budgets.

 We felt we had the resources to pull this together and to make it happen. We’re thrilled that it is happening and it is very nice to have all of our hard work honored in this way,” she said.



“In a city as large as Los Angeles, little RowLA is recognized as one of Los Angeles’ top twenty non-profits, and for good reason,” said USRowing Inclusion Manager, Richard Butler. “The mostly Hispanic girl’s academic rowing program is a highly sought after rowing program evidenced by the fact that three times the number of girls come to fall try-outs than can be accommodated. RowLA is proof that hard work, perseverance and vision are the key ingredients for success. I am thrilled that RowLA is being recognized for the Anita DeFranz Diversity Award.”



According to Greenberger, RowLa began in 2009 with four girls and one quad, purchased with grant money. They advertised, sought the help of local business and the community and began to expand the program. Girls now come to the program from communities across the city and in neighborhoods, where, sometimes, just being outside is not an option due to the dangers of the neighborhood.”

The girls are taught how to row and when they are not on the water, they are provided academic support, college counseling and nutrition awareness sessions. RowLA girls race in regattas, visit college campuses and give back to the community by teaching rowing at the Los Angeles Junior Blind Olympics.



“We bring our ergs to middle and high schools in Los Angeles and our free summer camps bring in well over 125 youngsters,” Greenberger said. “The RowLA competitive team is comprised of minority students and there are six seniors now being recruited to college crew teams from Seattle to Boston, and they stay in close touch with our first graduate who attends Smith College on a full scholarship,” she said. 


RowLA partners with the Los Angeles rowing community and mentors and tutors come from other rowing clubs and from the local college crew teams. 

“We might be part of boat maintenance at one club and scrimmage another club all in the same weekend,” Greenberger said, “demonstrating the tremendous value of diversity and inclusion in the sport.”



The award is named in honor of Anita DeFrantz, who won a bronze medal rowing in the U.S. women’s eight in the 1976 Olympics, the first time women rowers were allowed to compete. DeFrantz was captain of the U.S. rowing team. She has been, and continues to be, a leader and advocate for women’s inclusion in sport. In 1986, the International Olympic Committee appointed DeFrantz to lifetime membership.

 She was the fifth woman to ever hold a seat on the IOC and is both the first African-American and the first American woman to serve on the committee. She became the first female vice-president of the IOC executive committee in 1997.



DeFrantz led an unsuccessful effort to overturn the 1980 Olympic boycott but was appointed vice president of the 1984 Los Angeles Games Organizing Committee and helped convince 43 African nations not to boycott the games after South African runner Zola Budd was allowed to compete for Great Britain. 

As a member of the IOC, DeFrantz was instrumental in getting women’s soccer and softball added as medal sports in time for the 1996 Olympic Games in Atlanta. She also serves as vice president for FISA, the international governing body for rowing.



USRowing recognizes individuals and organizations for their contributions and achievements in the sport in 14 categories. To read more about these categories and to get information about the Golden Oars Awards Dinner, please click here.

Golden Oars Awards

Time for awards. NRF's website writes:

USRowing is pleased to announce the second annual Golden Oars Awards Dinner, presented by One Equity Partners. The dinner is scheduled for Wednesday, November 14 at the New York Athletic Club in New York City.

Co-hosted by USRowing and the National Rowing Foundation, the dinner will honor excellence in our sport during 2012 and serve as a fundraiser for USRowing’s national teams and its diversity, inclusion and adaptive programs. The celebration will feature the presentation of many of USRowing’s annual awards including the Fan’s Choice Awards, and will honor 2012 Olympians, Paralympians and U.S. national teams.

Read more here.

Glide along like a Swan

Tom Aggar of Great Britain will compete in the men's adaptive single sculls event in the upcoming Paralympic Games at Eton Dorney. He will defend his championship title from the 2008 Paralympic Games. Aggar is also a four-time World Champion in the boat class (2007, 2009, 2010, and 2011). Photo: British Rowing.

A week from today, on Friday, 31 August, the Paralympic Games are starting in London, with the rowing at Eton Dorney. Read more about the athletes and the regatta on FISA’s website here. Adaptive rowing has been around for quite some time now. Here is an article about a ‘disabled rowing’ regatta held in Oxford almost three decades ago. Author is Chris Dodd, famous rowing historian at the River and Rowing Museum, rowing journalist and writer, who had this piece published on 19 September, 1984, in his newspaper at the time, The Guardian. Thank you to Chris for allowing HTBS to re-publish it.

19 September, 1984

Chris Dodd

Rowing is a sport that could offer much to the disabled. Here Christopher Dodd reports on a British initiative to grant them freedom of the river:

Trevor Cox was penalised for using his leg to move his sliding seat during a recent sculling race on the Isis. It’s the only leg he’s got, but his two-legged opponent had no power in either of his. They were taking part in Britain’s first regatta for the disabled at Oxford, a remarkable day of courage and enjoyment. No one bar Bob Glendinning, who is partially blind as a result of multiple sclerosis, had been in a boat three months before the event.

A rowing club has been set up by Oxford and District Sport and Recreation Association for the Disabled (Oxrad) and Richard Yonge, a researcher at the Radcliffe and past president of Oxford University Boat Club. Two years ago Yonge helped out at the United States Rowing Association’s [now called USRowing] all-Disabled regatta in Philadelphia, where he saw amputees, paraplegics, the blind, victims of spina bifida, cerebral palsy, and the mentally handicapped propelling twin-hulled Rowcats. One of the athletes told him: ‘The good thing about rowing is that on land we are so ungainly when we try to get about, but on the water we just glide along like a swan. Nobody knows you are disabled. In fact, you sometimes forget it yourself.’

Yonge realised that a programme could be run easily in Oxford, where there is water on the doorstep and an army of able-bodied rowers to help out. Last May sculling began for those who can swim in Westminster College’s pool using a single hulled Playboat, a stable learning craft developed for beginners and loaned by the Amateur Rowing Association, ARA [now called British Rowing].

Graham Jones, another past president of OUBC, did some of the coaching. ‘They learned to manoeuvre the boat much quicker than most able-bodied oarsmen,’ he says. ‘There’s only room to take three strokes in the pool before you have to turn round.’ Most are out on the river after three sessions in the pool. At the regatta two of the competitors were using regular sculling boats, and there was a crew event in coxed tub pairs in which able-bodied oarsmen teamed up with disabled rowers. The blind were steered by towpath runners with megaphones, ARA officials officiated, Blues and college oarsmen provided extra manpower, and the watermanship on display was better than that showed by most of those trying their hand at punting nearby.

The Americans have been running programmes for the disabled for some time, and it is to them that we can look to see what can be done. Doug Herland was born in Oregon in 1951 with four broken ribs, a broken collarbone and pelvis. He suffered brittle bones and lived with almost constant breakages until he grew to 4 ft. 8 in. The Catch 22, he says, is that when his bones solidified in puberty there was no muscle to protect them.

A particularly serious swimming accident in his late teens left him in a wheelchair and walking with sticks for five years. But in August he won a bronze medal at the Olympic Games, wedged into the bows of a boat on his back and steering two giant oarsmen in the race of their lives. Herland walked from his boat to have his medal hung round his neck – after seven attempts to get a US team place. His high school baseball coach had suggested coxing to him. Later, he took up weight training and sculling, and he hasn’t used sticks to walk since then.

‘Rowing is excellent for the disabled,’ Herland says. ‘It causes no jarring in the joints.’ After working as a janitor while unpaid rowing coach at the University of Michigan he set up a programme for mobility impaired people called Freedom on the River.

‘If you want to organise something, get a paraplegic,’ he says. ‘If anyone is an expert on organisation, it is a quadriplegic. He has to be, just to go somewhere or do something.’ He has been trying to get Rowing in the Mainstream afloat as a countrywide programme for the able-bodied and the disabled, so far without success. But the schemes that have started have worked wonders for some of the participants.

Herland has sat on a Rowcat with a quadriplegic with no use in his arms and helped him twice up the pool by doing the puling. ‘On the third trip I took my hands off the oar. He realised that I wasn’t helping him. His eyes were full of wonder. “I’m doing this,’ he said. That guy has rowed three miles by himself and no longer has weights on his oars to get the blades out of the water.’

Richard Yonge is blessed with an able body and an enthusiasm for jarring people into joining his project. Oxrad has raised about £500 of the £700 they need to buy their own Playboat, and Falcon Rowing Club has offered them a roof. They hope to stage a demonstration at Stoke Mandeville’s pool soon, and Yonge wants other places with water, pools, a boat, and sympathetic rowers to get started so that they can come and race at Oxford next year.

Caught At The Golden Oars Awards Dinner?

Last week the 2011 Golden Oars Awards were handed out in New York. USRowing's website offers 163 photographs of the men and women who received the awards, and other guests. So if you are curious who was there, or if you were caught by the camera, please click here.

By the way - Congratulations to the 2011 Award winners!

2011 Ernestine Bayer Award

USRowing has announced the recipient of the 2011 Ernestine Bayer Award, Mayrene Earle, founder of MastersCoaching in 2002. The award, formerly known as the Women of the Year Award, is given in recognition of outstanding contributions to women’s rowing and/or to an outstanding woman in rowing and is selected by the female members of USRowing Board of Directors. Earle will be honored at the USRowing Annual Convention in Hartford, Connecticut, on 1-4 December.



“It’s quite an honor,” said Earle according to USRowing’s press release. “I’d like to think that I’ve contributed a lot to women’s rowing in the 30 to 40 years I’ve been doing it, particularly since I started this master’s coaching group.” She continued “Coaching for masters women isn’t a high priority on most coach’s lists in club programs, so they come to me for a little extra coaching. I’d like to think that I’m making a huge difference in their lives on the water as well as off the water.”

The Ernestine Bayer Award is named after Ernestine Bayer, who pushed her husband, Ernie Bayer, 1928 Olympic silver medallist in the coxless four, to allow her to row on the Schuylkill River in Philadelphia. There she founded one of the first women rowing clubs, the Philadelphia Girl’s Rowing Club. Bayer was the first woman inducted to the National Rowing Foundation’s Rowing Hall of Fame, and the first woman to receive the USRowing Medal. She died in 2006, at the age of 97.

Read more about Mayrene Earle and the The Ernestine Bayer Award here.

More USRowing Awards

USRowing has announced two new award recipients, who will receive their prizes at the Golden Oars Award Dinner in New York on 30 November. Bill Stowe (on the left), oarsman, coach, leader, and author, will receive the Jack Kelly Award, while the organisation Row New York is the recipient of the USRowing Anita DeFrantz Award, a newly established award which will, according to USRowing’s web site “be given annually to honor leaders in diversity and inclusion”.

The Jack Kelly Award, named after Jack Kelly Jr, ‘Kell’, is “given to outstanding individuals who represent the ideals which Jack Kelly exemplified”, it is also said that “the award recognizes superior achievements in rowing, service to amateur athletics, and success in their chosen profession, thereby serving as an inspiration to American rowers”.

In USRowing’s press release Stowe is quoted saying: “I think it’s very kind. Kell was a good friend, and this award is very much appreciated. It’s exciting. I’m looking forward to being recognized in New York at the dinner.” Stowe has written a book, All Together (2005), about the Vesper eight, which took a gold medal at the 1964 Olympic rowing. Stowe was in the stroke seat in that boat. Read more about Bill Stowe and his career here.

Row New York, which has been named the first recipient of Anita DeFrantz Award, started nine years ago to make rowing accessible to young people from the city’s urban neighborhood who maybe otherwise would not have the opportunity to try the sport. “The program provides both athletic and academic opportunities to over 300 young people from New York’s under-resourced communities and is a leader in the effort to increase minority participation in rowing,” USRowing’s website states.

Amanda Kraus, Executive Director of Row New York, said that the organisation is “thrilled to be recognized for these efforts by USRowing.”

The award is named in honor of Anita DeFrantz (on the right), who won a bronze medal in the U.S. women’s eight in the 1976 Olympics, the first time women were allowed to compete in rowing. DeFrantz was the U.S. rowing team’s captain. “She has been, and continues to be, a leader and advocate for women’s inclusion in sport. In 1986, the International Olympic Committee appointed DeFrantz to lifetime membership”.

Read more about DeFrantz, who was inducted in the National Rowing Hall of Fame in 2010, and the award here.

For more information about the Golden Oars Awards Dinner, click here. To purchase a ticket or secure a table, please click here.

Harry Parker Awarded 2011 USRowing Medal

Yesterday, USRowing announced that longtime Harvard University and former Olympic coach Harry Parker had been awarded the 2011 USRowing Medal.



Given in recognition to a member of the U.S. rowing community, who has accomplished extraordinary feats in rowing, the Medal is the highest honor USRowing can bestow. Parker, 75, will be honored at the inaugural Golden Oars Awards Dinner on Wednesday, 30 November, at the New York Athletic Club in New York City.



“It is appropriate to recognize the achievements of Coach Harry Parker with the USRowing Medal of Honor at our first-ever Golden Oars Awards event,” said USRowing Chief Executive Officer Glenn Merry. “He is iconic in the sport of rowing and stands amongst the top coaches in the world. The U.S. Team benefited greatly through his coaching at several Olympic Games and many of our finest rowers developed during their time at Harvard. I suspect many rowers and coaches share my admiration for Coach Parker. It is with great enthusiasm that we celebrate his contributions to the sport and his life as an oarsman.”



“I recognize it’s a distinct honor and I appreciate it,” said Parker. “Honors are not my thing; my thing is coaching. That’s what I get a real sense of satisfaction from.”



Now in his 50th season as the Thomas Bolles Head Coach of Men’s Crew at Harvard, Parker is considered one of the most accomplished rowing coaches in the history of the sport. After being promoted from interim head coach to head coach in 1963 following Harvard’s victory over Yale University in the Harvard-Yale Race, Parker’s crews have achieved unprecedented success. His crews’ achievements include 21 undefeated seasons; 27 EARC Sprints titles; 21 junior varsity sprints titles; eight official and eight unofficial national championships, three IRA championships since 2003 and a 42-7 record over Yale in the Harvard-Yale Race.



Under Parker, Harvard crews have competed internationally at the 1968 Olympics and the 1967 World Rowing Championships. He was named the men’s Olympic coach for 1972, where he led the U.S. eight to a silver medal in Munich, Germany. He also served as coach of the first U.S. women’s crew to compete in the World Championships, winning a medal in 1975. Parker later coached the U.S. women’s eight to a bronze medal at the 1976 Olympic Games in Montreal.



Parker attended the University of Pennsylvania, where he majored in English and learned to row. Following college, Parker began sculling competitively, and won the men’s single sculls at the 1959 Pan American Games. That same year, Parker finished second at the Henley Royal Regatta to six-time champion Stuart MacKenzie. In 1960, he represented the United States in the event in the Olympic Games in Rome, where he finished fifth.



Parker was inducted to the National Rowing Foundation’s National Rowing Hall of Fame as a coach in 1974 and as an oarsman in 1977.

USRowing Golden Oars Awards Dinner

Save the date!
USRowing Golden Oars Awards Dinner
Wednesday, November 30, 2011 at 6 p.m.

An annual Gala to recognize excellence in Rowing for 2011, and to support the athletes of the US National Teams and the America Rows and USRowing Adaptive Programs.

Co-hosted by USRowing and the National Rowing Foundation, the celebration will kick off the “Row to London” and will feature a presentation of several of USRowing’s highest honors, as well as the introduction of the Diversity and Adaptive Awards and new USRowing “Fan’s Choice” Awards. The evening will include a cocktail reception with open bar and hors d’oeuvres, seated dinner and a live and silent auction.

A portion of the ticket price is tax-deductible. Payment accepted via Mastercard, Visa and Discover Card or you may send a check, payable to USRowing:

Attn: Beth Kohl,
USRowing,
2 Wall Street
Princeton, NJ 08540

If you cannot attend please consider making a donation to the National Rowing Foundation
www.natrowing.org/support.htm

New York Athletic Club
180 Central Park South
New York, NY 10019
Phone: (203) 761-8643
Website: usrowing.org
E-Mail: beth@usrowing.org

Cost: Table of 10: $3,000; or Individual: $300

"USRowing's America Rows" Wins Grant

In a press release USRowing writes about a grant the organization has won:

Following a 12-day voting period on Facebook, USRowing’s America Rows Program was one of six grand prize winners of the inaugural Team USA Grants.

America Rows and the other grand prize winners will receive $12,000 grants, which are intended to assist programs within the U.S. Olympic and Paralympic family that aim to improve sustained competitive excellence, instill the Olympic Values and grow sport participation in the U.S.

“We are really excited at the response from the community to the Team USA Grants competition,” said USRowing Chief Executive Officer Glenn Merry. “I think it demonstrates that rowing is ready to address and support the issues around inclusion and access to rowing in America. America Rows is an important strategic initiative for our organization.”

America Rows is USRowing’s nationwide diversity and inclusion initiative aimed at increasing awareness of rowing and introducing the sport to a diverse group of Americans. The program hopes to increase the number of Hispanic and Latino Americans, African-Americans and Asian-Americans who participate in rowing, as well as increase the participation of the physically disabled. The Team USA Grant will allow USRowing to provide mini grants to America Rows affiliates across the country.

To read the entire press release, please click here.