Heroes

Sprinting against the USA Junior Men's Eight in Princeton.  Thank you to them and to our coach Craig for
setting up this practice, let's do it again.

As of this post, we are up to forty-two contributors on the fundraising page for our boat to go to the World Championships.  Contributors?  More like Heroes.  Without the support of these Heroes we would not be able to represent our country abroad.  After all, it's not America that sends Team USA to Worlds... it's Americans!  If you'd like to join the ever-growing list of heroes, click here:

Yes, I want to be a Hero.

Training involves a lot of ab wheel.

Training is going well for the US LM4x.  We have 14 days until we leave for Bulgaria, and as the championships approach so does our focus and the quality of our work sharpen up.  Usually we row without another boat beside us, so this weekend to test our speed we drove up to Princeton to do a practice with the USA Junior Men's Eight.  Their championships take place simultaneously with ours, so in theory they should be at a similar cycle of their training to us.  It was a great learning experience for us as a crew, to see how we responded to another boat also going full-tilt in the lane next to us.  One of the mantras of our boat has been to always be going for the next level, that next gear, those few extra seconds over the race distance.  What better way to work on this kind of speed than to have a junior men's eight (a boat class which should be slightly quicker than we are) one lane over?  A huge thank-you to the crew and their coaches and our Coach Craig, who were generous enough to arrange this special practice for us.  It's so much more fun to race someone other than just yourselves!  Afterwards calls for some serious nutrition, including but not limited to buttered muffins, omelets, and home-cooked meals prepared for you by someone thoughtful enough to do so.  Ah, the perks of lots of exercise.

Buttered muffins from Bob's Diner.

A gooey omelet after only the most severe of sessions.

Honey's in Northern Liberties makes an incredible
wheat pancake stuffed with granola and fresh berries.

Buttering a loaf after a long bike ride post-row.

Thank You Liz for making me my favorite salad:
mixed greens, crumbled gouda, walnuts, dried
cranberries, apples, olive oil and vinegar dressing

Athlete bios are up on USRowing.org for the Senior Team, a minor milestone for some who have made the team many times over, such as the other three athletes in my boat, Sam, Shane, and Bob, but for me it is something that carries meaning, to see my name along with rowers far faster than I, and makes me hunger to bring something to the crew each day.  I had to acknowledge The Blades, my band with Riverside Boat Club, as a major part of my rowing career.  And P.S., I am currently sitting at 3, with Bob at 2, although we have experimented with multiple lineups and seen some really positive increases in speed come out of switching things up.

Speaking of The Blades, there's quite a lot of social media being thrown around these days, especially by the rowing crowd at all levels.  Personally I draw inspiration from multiple sources, the serious and the seriously funny, while trying to pay little attention to the "gossip" side of the sport.  Get rowers talking about rowing and they'll never shut up (guilty as charged), but occasionally there's a message therein to be processed and integrated into a superior attitude about the sport... a kind of catalyst for new understandings about your rowing career, possibly your life.

I would like to thank two outstanding contributors to the online world of rowing, on vastly different sides of the equation, both of whom have seen me through this year and without whose help, whether they know it or not, I would not be where I am today, lucky enough to be rowing pain-free on the National Team.

Drew Ginn (middle): Olympic Gold Medalist, blogger, inspiration.

1. Drew Ginn, and his blog Rudderfish.  Stumbling across this blog in the early days of my disc injury was as important as the countless hours of physical therapy.  This blog gave me direction during some pretty rough times, and continues to be a source of inspiration as Drew Ginn prepares to race in the World Cup champion Australian Men's Heavy Four at the Olympics, this week!  He's won gold before, in 1996, 2004, and 2008, all the while working through multiple back surgeries and other issues.  His attitude is superlative and positive.  Certainly he is one of the greatest rowers of all time.  From his blog I borrowed my favorite creed, sustaining me since last summer: "The process is the result."

Andrew Neils: Cromwell Games Participant, TheBlade, friend.

2. Andrew Neils, and his blog The Seat Pad.  Beginning earlier this summer as a chronicle of one man's journey to Cromwell Games (Cup) Gold, The Seat Pad has since its inception been one of the highlights of my week.  Neils is a great friend of mine, rower, and competitor.  We both won 2nd at the 2010 Canadian Henley in the LM4x (me at stroke him at 2), going 5:59 and beating National Champions New York Athletic Club, in a boat that really had no business going that fast.  I also raced Neils at the Olympic Trials this spring in the LM2x.  But all that aside... Neils is THE Drummer of The Blades.  That's right.  Rockstar.  He recently gave a shoutout to this blog on his afterthoughts post-Cromwell Games 2012.

Mahé celebrates and Neils wins.

Kindred spirits on different tracks, Neils has sustained his blog as a glorious send-up of blogs that rowers usually keep, about how hard they train, what they eat, the lies we tell ourselves about how unbelievably, world-crushingly fast we're going... usually during those practices alone when nobody is around to see it.  Man, if only they were!  Hey what blog does that sound like....

Me (left) and Neils (right)
Riverside Boat Club Canadian Henley LM4x 2010:
Dave Smith
Andrew Hashway
Andrew Neils
James Tracey

I leave it to you, reader, to decide which path draws you in more - Pure, clean training and reflection on the meaning of highest level achievement, or tongue-in-cheek chuckling over the absurdity of training for anything, for any reason, for putting life on hold for such meaningless tasks as rowing.

Also, if you are interested enough in this blog to continue to read it to the end of this post... another shameless solicitation: Please consider supporting us today, a little, a lot, and who knows, you might even get some sweet piece of USA gear coming your way... click below!

Yes, I want to be a Hero.

Stay tuned, and subscribe!

A rare post-trials burrito indulgence from
Felipe's in Cambridge.  Nostalgia abounding.