Marietta High's girls lightweight 8 boat is hoping to cap its crew campaign on a high note at the 2009 SRAA Regatta at Mercer Lake in Mercerville, N.J. Friday and Saturday.
The Lady Tiger Navy shell includes Jessie Gearhart (coxswain), Amy McNearny (8), Stephanie Williams (7), Hannah McKenzie (6), Louise Nouvellon (5), Emily Walsh (4), Emily Furl (3), Annie Weaver (2), and Marcie Dyar (bow).
All of the rowers, who are guided by first-year MHS skipper Sara Armstrong, are underclassmen.
"This season, the lightweight crew has been relatively untested in their weight class," Armstrong said.
But in the procees, the girls have improved with every race, and become battle-tested on the water.
"They rowed against open weight crews in most races including the dual with Oakland Catholic and the Pittsburgh Sprints where they were quite competitive, but outsized losing by less than a boat length at the former and not qualifying for finals at the latter," Armstrong said.
At the Cincinatti Invitational regatta, the Marietta boat competed against both other high schools as well as rowing clubs, and did not qualify for finals.
The governor's cup in Columbus saw the boat scratched due to a time conflict with the Novice 8 which half of the rowers are hot-seated (raced twice) in.
The Midwest would have been the Lady Tiger Navy boat's first medals of the season, but...
"With a strong hold on second place, Louise Nouvellon's oar broke with 500 meters (approximately one-third of the race) to go and the boat finished fifth out of seven in a race where the top three finishers are accepted as contestants in the Scholastic Rowing Association of America Nationals," Armstrong said.
It was a tough break for the Marietta lightweight 8, but Armstrong was not deterred. The Tiger crew coach decided to pursue the matter further, knowing full well that the orange and black boat deserved better.
To make a long story short....
"After petitioning our special circumstances to the SRAA, the boat was accepted," Armstrong said.
With an extension on the season, this Friday and Saturday, the Marietta boat will be racing against 14 other teams that qualified from various races around the country.
Needless to say, the Lady Tiger Navy is pumped and ready to row.
"The past week of practices has seen a great improvement on technique and speed - and a few pre-race jitters," Armstrong said. "I am confident that they will be quite competitive at Mercer Lake this weekend."
