For the fifth year in a row, Seattle Pacific University Rowing will compete in the National Collegiate Athletic Association Championship in Gainesville, Georgia. From Friday, May 29 to Saturday, May 30, the Varsity 8+ and the Varsity 4+ boats will represent Seattle Pacific after the V8+ won third place at the Great Northwest Athletic Conference.
The team has begun preparing for the upcoming championship, and senior business marketing major and varsity rower Amelia Pape was excited to see the progress made by the V8+ boat over the season. Pape expressed her confidence in the crew’s determination to succeed.
“In the past, this boat has been kind of considered the underdog, and this is the first year we really haven’t been that way, and we’ve had other crews on edge. We’re ready to go, and we know we have the fitness. We’re just trying to tighten up a few things,” Pape said.
One of the ways head coach Kenzie Waltar has prepared the team for the NCAA has involved a focus on strengthening their sprints. Waltar explained her strategy to improve the team’s endurance.
“At least in the [V8+], coming down to the sprint, it was very bow [to] bow [to] bow the whole time and then towards the end the other crews broke away. We’ve been doing work that is longer than a 2K, because if you can sprint for longer than a 2K, you can sprint for a 2K,” Waltar said.
Creating a dynamic of trust has helped the team to become a more cohesive crew according to senior sociology major and V4+ coxswain Lexi Roybal. Roybal discussed the importance of fostering relationships within each boat.
“Boat culture is a little bit different from team culture because it’s so specialized within the boat. So there’s five of us in my boat, there’s nine of you guys in the eight, and even though we’re all a part of the same team, within each boat that culture looks different. That’s facilitated by a bunch of people, it’s not just one person who is doing all of the work,” Roybal said.
Waltar reflected on her first year as head coach, talking about what the team has achieved because of their work ethic during the season.
“There’s just things you don’t know until you’re doing the thing. It’s exciting, it’s crazy, it’s terrifying to be like oh, first year, we go to NCAA. That’s just a testament to who they are and how they’ve accepted the work,” Waltar said.
