THE SPORT OF ROWING They won the 1992 Olympic Gold Medal over Romania and Germany. Silken Laumann The most famous Modern Orthodox Canadian rower of the era, in fact the most famous Canadian rower since Ned Hanlan, was and remains single sculler Silken6741 Laumann. Laumann: “I grew up in Mississauga, which is just outside of Toronto, the middle of three kids. My sister’s older and my brother is younger. “My parents are German immigrants. My mom is from East Germany, and my dad is from West Germany. They met in Berlin, and my mom snuck out of East Germany in 1960 before the wall went up. My dad was a bit of a risk-taker, and like so many Europeans, he saw Canada as a new frontier, a place of opportunity. He came here for the first time at the age of nineteen. Then he went back to Germany, met my mom and said, ‘Let’s move to Canada.’ She said yes. “My first sport was track and field. I was an 800-meter runner. I was already training pretty seriously by the time I was fourteen, so by the time I started rowing in 1981 at seventeen, I was in great shape. I could run ten miles without thinking. I started right away rowing internation- ally.”6742 Laumann sculled for Canada throughout the 1980s, but without reaching the level of success she desired. She and her sister, Daniele Laumann, placed third in the women’s doubles at the 1984 Olympics, but they had already been beaten by GDR, the Soviets and Bulgarians at the Internationale 6741 “My mother is an artist, very original and unique, and she heard the word ‘silken’ being used as an adjective and thought it was beautiful and would make a really beautiful name.” – Laumann, personal conversation, 2010 6742 Laumann, personal conversation, 2010 Rotsee Regatta earlier that same summer. Those three crews were among those who boycotted the Los Angeles Olympics. After Spracklen arrived in Canada in late 1989, Laumann began working out with him and his men’s team as often as three times a day. The improvement in her results paralleled those of her male counterparts, beginning with a Silver Medal at the 1990 World Championships on Lake Barrington in Australia. Laumann: “There were times in my rowing career when I sort of hit sweet spots in my rowing technique. One was 1990 on Lake Barrington. I would get a rhythm going, and it felt like I could row at that intensity and that rhythm forever. 1991 Laumann: “I was in fabulous form in 1991. I had had a really solid season in 1990 where I kind of made the leap from seventh in the world to second, and I just built on that. I think technically I was at the top of my game, and age-wise [26] it was a perfect time in my life to realize my potential.”6743 After she had won the 1991 World Cup Singles title, Silken moved on to the World Championships in Vienna. Her strongest competition in the final would come from 1989 World Singles Champion 6’0” 183cm 177lb. 80kg Elisabeta Lipa of Dinamo Bucureşti in Romania. Laumann: “I remember waking up that day, looking out the window and just going, ‘Wow, it’s really windy!’ but rather than thinking that I’m twenty pounds lighter and a couple of inches shorter than Lipa and the headwind favored the bigger rower, I focused on the fact I had trained really hard. 6743 Ibid. 1866
