THE SPORT OF ROWING Aserlind: “One of my favorite memories was at the 1974 IRA. The June culmination of our collegiate season fell after a week of final exams. Because of exam schedules and Jabo’s desire to get in some small-boat work, the Varsity Eight had spent the week rowing only in fours and pairs. “We climbed onto the bus for our two- day ride (with an overnight stay at the fabled Toledo Turnpike Motel) to Syracuse and arrived tired, stiff, hungry and cranky on a stifling afternoon to rig the eight and row on the Erie Canal. After ‘friggin’ with the riggin’’ for what seemed an interminable time, we pushed off and pulled away, rowing by pairs as people tied in and warmed up. “Finally, the coxswain ordered ‘Ready all. Row!’ The boat leapt like it never had before. The next stroke, the same thing. Again and again. For perhaps twenty or thirty strokes we rowed like that, long and low. The boat was flying, and we were barely at half pressure! We stopped with our oars off the water, in perfect balance as the water hissed by. Many meters later we floated to a stop. No one said a word. “Finally, stroke Jim Dyreby4894 exhaled’ ‘Holy [cow]!’ “Nobody else said a word as we continued on, afraid to disturb the magic. We had reached rowing nirvana. “It held, and four days later we won the varsity eights championship on Lake Onondaga.”4895 Wisconsin’s men’s team during this era had a substantial influence on U.S. National Team rowing. Randy Jablonic coached the U.S. Men’s Eight in 1981, 1982 and 1983,4896 and various Badger rowers made 4894 one of just a handful of athletes in history to win the IRA four times. Besides stroking the 1973-75 Varsities, he was 6 on the 1972 IRA Champion Freshmen. 4895 Aserlind, op. cit. 4896 See Chapter 124. the National Team over the years, most notably Tim Mickelson ‘70, 5 in the 1972 Olympic Silver Medal Eight4897 and bow in the 1974 World Champion Eight,4898 Eric Aserlind ‘75, 5 in the 1974 World Champion Lightweight Eight, Bob Espeseth ‘75, stroke of the 1986 World Champion Coxless-Four,4899 and Beau Hoopman ‘03, 7 in the 2004 Olympic Champion Eight.4900 Under Coach Chris Clark,4901 the Wisconsin Men’s Varsity reestablished itself in the top echelon of American rowing, winning the IRA in 2008. Wisconsin Women The University of Wisconsin has actually had an even greater influence on mid-20th Century American rowing on the women’s side. Even during the 19th Century, participation by females in anything even resembling competitive sport had been limited to parlor games and social lawn sports like croquet. For the British aristocracy and their counterparts worldwide, upper class ladies were being prepared for a life of afternoon teas, and for every other female it was the prospect of a life of domestic servitude. Those women around the world who actually rowed prior to the mid-20th Century tended to do so at first recreationally and later with far less intensity than men. When women’s events were added to the European Championships in 1954, they were allowed to row only 1,000 meters, half the men’s distance, in consideration of the inherent frailty of their gender. 4897 See Chapter 103. 4898 See Chapter 111. 4899 See Chapter 132. 4900 See Chapter 156. 4901 See Chapter 144. 1364
