THE LONG ECLIPSE OF AMERICAN ROWING 104. The Rude and Smooth Years Al Shealy – 1975 Grand Challenge Cup After seven consecutive wins at the Eastern Sprints, Harvard lost from 1971 to 1973, but they continued to win against Yale. The 1972 Harvard Freshman Crew was the start of something very special, as Tiff Wood, the young man who ended up in the 4-seat, remembers: “One of the keys to Harry’s greatest years was the skill of his Freshman Coach. He had great crews as long as Ted Washburn was there. “When I started as a freshman, I was not one of those who Ted recruited heavily for the heavyweight crew. I weighed in at 155 or less, and the story I have heard is that my coach at St Paul’s had told Harry that I would make a good lightweight. “Steve Gladstone was coaching the lightweights at the time,4785 and in 1971 he had the ‘Super Boat’ that won at Henley and raced at Lucerne, so lightweights seemed a reasonable way to go. “I joined the lightweight program, but as the fall progressed, it became clear that our freshman coach, Dick Prentke, had his eye on someone else for the stroke seat. “Now you have to understand that I had always liked stroking, and one of the attractions of rowing lightweights was a hope that I could end up in the stroke seat, but Rick Grogan [destined to stroke the 1974 World Champion U.S. Lightweight Eight] was also in my class, and for some strange reason Prentke made it clear, without ever saying so directly, that he had Rick pegged for the stroke seat. 4785 See Chapter 105. “So, as that thought began to sink in, I became less and less satisfied with the idea of rowing lights. I mean, as a senior at St. Paul’s, we had raced and beaten Harvard’s freshman lightweights, so here I was a year older trying to make a slower boat? “And on top of that, when you give up so much for rowing anyway, why also give up eating? “So a little before Thanksgiving I switched. No big deal was made of it, I don’t know if Dick particularly cared. “That Freshman Heavyweight Crew of 1972 really was exceptional. If you look at some of the later success of the rowers, I’m not sure many can match us. All but Mark Moulton, who stopped rowing after freshman year, ultimately made the Varsity. “Entire port side on the National Team, Ed Woodhouse within a hair of making a team, Blair Brooks could have if he had wanted to, I believe. Ronnie Shaw made a decent showing at the camp in 1975. “We had no idea how fast we were, or even if we were fast. I wonder if our coach had any idea of what he had at the start of the season. “One of the most memorable things for me was the way Ted Washburn managed to have us convinced before each race that even though we had won the previous week’s race by miles, this week would be different, this next crew was for real, and we’d better be ready for a real contest. 1329
