THE ERA OF POLARIZATION 1984 by the 6’7” Olympic Quads Trials- winner Ridgely Johnson. Tiff and Biggie were good, but never quite the best. Andy Sudduth won it in 1985 and repeated in 1987 and 1988. Wood: “Andy was a mild mannered, sweet guy. He loved to race. I remember actually being pretty happy that he was not going to switch to single sculling until after ‘84. It was already evident that he was a prodigy.”7397 Biglow: “I have fond memories of rowing on the Charles with Harry coaching Andy, Tiff, and me, before Andy found his top speed. “He was very stubborn. I could get ahead, but he never gave up, never caved in. Very strong. “I never did overlap with him after he became the U.S. Sculler.”7398 Andy was plucked from the U.S. Under- 23 Eight at the age of 19 to row on his first senior team in 1981. They won a Silver Medal. Was he the best oarsman Harry Parker had ever coached at Harvard? Parker: “There’s no way to compare different people from one era to another. But he’s certainly one of the very best that we’ve ever had.”7399 1985 World Championships By the time Andy lined up for the final of the men’s singles at the World Championships in Hazewinkel, Belgium, in just the previous twelve months he had already won the Championship Singles at the Head of the Charles, won the CRASH- 7397 Wood, op. cit. 7398 Biglow, personal correspondence, 2009 7399 Qtd. by Malcolm Moran, Olympic Rower Sets Sights on ‘88, The New York Times, May 11, 1985 Surely it must have seemed that no one rower could possibly achieve any more in a single year than Andy already had in 1985, but it might not have happened at all if his 7400 Zimmerman, tribute to Andy at the Head of the Charles, 2006 Bs, and stroked the Harvard Varsity to wins at the Eastern Sprints, the Harvard-Yale Race (the first Harvard win in five years), the U.S. College Championship in Cincinnati and the Grand Challenge Cup at Henley. Devon Mahoney Zimmerman, 1985 Harvard coxswain: “At Henley the night we won the Grand, the entire boat decided that tradition must be upheld and proceeded to strip and jump off the bridge right beside the Leander Club boathouse. Andy Hawley still remembers watching Suds, buck naked, climbing up the railing of the pub by the river to the deep amusement of those drinking on the porch, then racing off down the street, white skin glowing, cackling away, with two English bobbies in hot pursuit.”7400 2065
