Dayton Looks to Continue Last Year's Success

Dayton's lightweights were undefeated last spring and one of this year's captains is a lightweight. Looks like they're giving lightweights some respect at Dayton.

Fall Racing Begins

The fall season has begun with Wisco racing at The Milwaukee River Challenge and Georgetown racing at the Head of the Potomac. Wisconsin looks to be off to a good start as they went out to beat up on some local crews. Well, Purdue was there so that's not entirely fair and didn't they win the lightweight event at Dad Vails not too long ago? The lights finished in second behind the heavies and before the 2nd heavyweight boat. Wonder if they were racing even boats? Georgetown lights (finishing fifth) also finished behind one varsity boat (3rd) although both lightweight eights beat the 2nd varsity boat. The lighweights raced even crews. Navy won the race. Other than a few head races here and there, the first real look at these crews will be in Boston when they'll race as lightweights.

NCAA Championships for Men?

The same article on the Trojan Navy web site (see previous post) states that "the PAC-10 has proposed legislation to make Men’s Rowing an NCAA sport with a championship." If this were to pass, what would happen to the women's lightweight national championship which is now part of the IRAs? If the IRAs essentially became the men's NCAA championships, women would not be allowed to race there. Would there have to be a separate regatta? In its great quest for inclusiveness, the NCAA just seems to tear rowing apart. Championship regattas should be a celebration of rowing that includes men and women. We train together, we race together, and on occasion we even race together in the same boats. The NCAA wants none of that. Separate but equal is the watchword for NCAA rowing, you can bet your shirt on that.

Scholarships

It's amusing to read about the current scholarship tussle in the PAC-10. One thing lighweight women aren't familiar with is getting paid (aka scholarships) to row. My guess is that few lightweight programs offer scholarships (Wisconsin does?), and that includes extra "need based aid" in the Ivies. Am I wrong? Lightweight women's rowing is probably the last real college sport in which the participants compete for the love of their school and their sport.

Georgetown Hires a New Lightweight Coach

Georgetown announced that they hired Jim O'Conner as their new lightweight women's coach. Last year Rebecca Besant became Georgetown's first (I think) lightweight women's coach. Previously Jimmy King acted as both the heavyweight and lightweight coach. Rebecca's move was good news for the program because it suggested that the school was putting some effort behind its lightweights. As well they should since their crews have been steadily finishing higher and higher at IRAs. The Georgetown example shows how a program with a good rowing tradition can put some effort into lightweight rowing and develop an excellent reputation (the men are good too). When Rebecca left (I think she moved to Africa) many people outside of the program were holding their breath to see if the school would remain committed to lightweights. Jim O'Conner's hiring shows that they are. A good move for Georgetown and a good move for lightweight rowing.

ECAC Snubs Lightweights

Reading over the ECAC announcement that Princeton won the Boathouse Sports Trophy, I noticed that Princeton's lightweights weren't even mentioned when the school's results were discussed. It's as if they don't exist. This led me to look at the results for Eastern Sprints last spring. Lightweights don't count in scoring for the Willing Points Trophy. Novice fours count, for goodness sake! I don't know if lightweights count for the men, but I'll guess they do since they were listed in Princeton's results in the ECAC announcement. What's up with this?

USRowing Testing Procedures

Why does USRowing allow lightweight women to weigh 140 pounds at the April test? This is 15 pounds over the international average, while lightweight men may only be 10 pounds over. I'm not sure why these large weight fluctuations are allowed (encouraged, really), particularly when we hear of collegiate coaches who believe lightweight rowing is dangerous. By making 140 (or more) pound women believe they should be lightweights, USRowing sanctions dangerous weight loss and limits opportunities for natural lightweights.

Healthy Lightweight Entries at Worlds

A look at entries at the World Championships in Japan shows a healthy number of women's lightweight entries. Only 7 of the 23 events have more entries than the women's lightweight 2x (the Olympic event) and only 3 have more entries than the light women's 1x. At 7 entries the light women's 4x has about the same number of entries as the women's heavyweight 4x (9) and heavyweight 8+ (8). This points to the popularity of lightweight rowing at the elite level and suggests that it would be in USRowing's interest to promote collegiate lightweight rowing.

75 to 10

That's the number of fours racing at the 2005 IRA Regatta compared to the total number of women's lightweight boats. (The lightweight men only have 12 boats so they're not much better off. They can, however, shift some lightweights into fours.) To accomodate those fours there are 48 separate races compared to 4 four the lightweight women. Why is that? Do we really need both a varsity four with and a varsity four without? Why is there an open four in addition to a varsity four? If just two of these races were dropped, they could be replaced with men's and women's freshman lightweight 8 races. Or even lightweight 4 races. The fours go on so long at IRAs that in the middle of it all it is doubtful even the referees know exactly which race is going down the course. This is very hard to understand.

With Friends Like This...

...who needs enemies? This is an old story (2004), but what is up with Kris Sanford of Syracuse? In this story, the writer claims that programs such as Massachusetts and Villanova have an advantage over Syracuse because they have lightweight teams and Syracuse doesn't. This supposedly gives them more rowers to compete for the top heavyweight boat. The reader is left with the impression that Sanford believes this as well. This reasoning misses the fact that these programs (Villanova anyway) put out lightweight boats when they have a good group of lightweights in their program, not because they recruit lightweights. Schools that recruit lightweights don't switch them in and out of the heavyweight program. Syracuse, meanwhile, has the advantage of being able to recruit enough heavyweights to fill the available seats. This is no doubt a coach simply talking up the opposition for a news article.

Far more troubling, however, is Sanford's implication that all lightweight rowers lose an unsafe amount of weight to row, as if there are no natural lightweights. "It isn't safe," she says. If a coach doesn't understand how to run a "safe" lightweight program herself, she shouldn't assume it can't be done. This troglodyte attitude plays into unproven stereotypes of lightweight rowers as emaciated sticks who never eat. Gee, I wonder how they ever pull on an oar? This just isn't an issue in responsible programs (which nearly all are).

Does the NCAA Matter?

The NCAA does not hold a national championship for lightweights and some have suggested that this has held back the spread of lightweight rowing. The reasoning is that without an NCAA championship, schools will be reluctant to spend money on lightweights because they don't count toward the college's Title IX numbers. I don't think this holds water, though, because colleges make their own count of varsity athletes and undoubtedly include varsity lightweight women in those counts. If this is a problem, it's here for a while since the NCAA says it has no plans to hold a national championship for lightweights.

Worrying about an NCAA national championship misses the point. The IRAs work fine (although why have 6 million fours and no freshman lightweights?) and does anyone really want what the heavyweight women have - a small regatta that takes place in a different place at a different time than the end of year championship celebration for the rest of the collegiate rowing world? I don't think the lack of an NCAA championship is a barrier.

Cal Lightweight Rowing

CALIFORNIA LIGHTWEIGHT CREW
Cal has what seems to be a pretty nice lightweight club program - why not make it varsity? They already have equipment and coaches, so how difficult can it be? Lots more varsity women athletes (and Title IX benefits) for not a whole lot of work. Cal has excellent heavyweight teams so they ought to take a shot at dominating lightweights too.

Navy Lightweights?

USNA - Spring 2005
This Web page has pictures of Navy's lighweight women's crew. Who knew?

Speaking of Dad Vail

USROWING RANKS FLYER LIGHTWEIGHTS 6TH
Dayton's lightweights won the Dad Vail in 2005 and they had to have been the happiest boat on the river that day. I'm not sure if Dayton has ever raced this event before, but it was a great win for that program. The rowers couldn't stop smiling and they looked like they might float all the way back to Ohio. Hopefully this will give lightweight rowing some momentum at Dayton so the school can continue to put out competitive crews. Dayton doesn't talk about lightweights all that much, which makes it seem like they'll boat an eight only if they happen to have eight fast lighweight women. Maybe now they'll make it a bit more of a priority.

Bucknell is Building Its Lightweight Program

Bucknell Women's Rowing Announces 20-Person Recruiting Class

Five of the 20 members of the Class of '09 are lightweights. Bucknell has had a very successful lightweight program over the last few years, winning at Dad Vail in 2003 and placing second in 2004. In typical fashion, when the eight won in 2003, the headline of the news release on the Bucknell athletic Web site reads, "Bucknell Women's Crew Places Second at Dad Vail Regatta in Philadelphia." The heavy eight, of course, placed second, while the lightweights just, well, won a gold medal! Bucknell had no lightweights at Dad Vail in 2005. I wonder what happened? Especially odd since they recruited lightweights this year. No matter, it looks like they're building the program now. I don't know why more schools like Bucknell don't boat lightweight crews. They're much more likely to find athletic lightweights than athletic heavyweights and the lightweight field is more open making serious success more attainable.

Why This Blog Was Created

Fight in the Dog was created to champion the spread of women's lightweight collegiate rowing in the United States. As women's heavyweight programs have become the sport of choice for Title IX compliance, their growth has exploded. We'd like to see lightweights experience some of that growth as well. The NCAA, and therefore many colleges and universities, treat lightweight women as an afterthought, although some would argue that lightweights are more athletic, efficient, and closer to the modern ideal of a female athlete than heavyweights. We intend to highlight the accomplishments of women collegiate lightweight crews as well as discuss the issues facing lightweight rowing. We do not intend, however, to push for an NCAA lightweight championship for women - IRAs are just too much fun!

Questions or comments here.