Who's In?

This news from Xinhua on the Chinese gold-medal winning women's quad kept me captivated. I thought I would share. It feels like it should be presented in a big, heavy-paged fairy tale book. With gilt-edges and illuminated pages. Partly it's the poetic way the two languages meet, and partly it's the fatefulness of each person's place in life that comes across, as opposed to the individual drive of will and zeal that you get from American athletes (or reporters).

For example:

After being engaged in rowing, Jin almost had no time to spend with her family members.

    "After I entered the national team in 2003, I have had only ten days each year to spend with my family," recalled she.

and

    "We finally chose Zhang rather than Feng Guixin due to Zhang's daring spirit," said Zhou Qinian, head coach of sculling group of Chinese rowing team.

Happy olympic times, all!

Check out friend Mary's blog, 50 Eggs. She posts about the recent New York Times article on the Chinese rowing program (China is going full-tilt after sports that offer multiple medals). Featured prominently is Igor Grinko, a former Soviet, then former U.S. sculling coach now a head coach in China. Many of my former rowing teammates rowed under him when he was coaching U.S. national team sculling prospects in Occoquan, Virginia, starting a couple of years before the 1992 Olympiad. It was a somewhat uncomfortable fit all round, but he was a coach with proven success, and there were high hopes here.

Mary has some personal experience with Igor. And she respectfully pulls no punches. He replies! Fascinating! 

What do you think? Is China doping its athletes? Did the Easties do it back in the day?  

Long silence. I blame the day job.  Honestly, I acknowledge it’s ridiculous to have such gaps in a so-called blog.

I’ve been meaning to point any passersby’s attention to an amusing post on rowing from one of my favorite blogs, The Disgruntled Chemist. (Ukrainian border guards arrested Belarus's national rowing team Tuesday for illegally entering the country on a flotilla of eight boats.) I think the DC must have rowed at one point. He points out a bonehead Yahoo.com choice of photo (of kayakers) to accompany a news story about rowing.

He does sum up the difference between canoeing, kayaking and rowing pretty well! But really this is just a good chance to mention this very likeable site.  

(I'm breaking the silence bit by bit here, clearing my throat....) 

A.E. Housman captured only a sliver of it in his poem, but he has a good title. So I borrow it to mark the passing of a huge figure from the pantheon of international rowing champions and generally noteworthy people.

On July 15, 2006, Andy Sudduth, age 44, died of pancreatic cancer. He had been diagnosed in September, 2005. I knew him for more than 20 years, trained alongside his very impressive rowing career, and had an inkling that he was a high-level geek as well. (The intellectual part of his life turns out to have been just as impressive as the athletic.) So I just want to take a moment, and direct any passersby to a few pages that remember and honor his life. May we all be so lucky to exit with such love and admiration.

It isn’t enough consolation for his daughters and others who love him, but he accomplished as much in his half an allotted lifespan as many do with the full three score and twenty. There is a big hole in the lives of those he leaves behind.

 

Or something.

I relinquish whatever daft notion I had of writing posts that were less personal and more magaziney. At least for awhile.

I had a list of things I thought I'd write about, now all stale. Like racing in the Head of the Charles Regatta. I do this every year, pretty much, regardless of fitness level or motivation level. I have missed four since I started, and one was cancelled for foul weather. If I mention my first entry (1979, in the mixed 8, an extinct event), it will give away my advanced age. But relevant, I suppose, as this is the first year I raced in the master's division. For an 8 (which is my boat of choice for this three-mile race, as it gets it over with quickest), the rowers have to average 40 years of age. This was one of those years when motivation was sorely lacking. We had a depressingly mediocre race the previous year in the lightweight category (rowers weight must average 130), and I vowed I wouldn't race again unless I trained more.

Given the broken hand I mentioned earlier somewhere in this blog, plus general sloth, I rowed even less this year than last. But ah, peer pressure. I race with old cronies from back in the day when we were serious, and it is a bit more of a social thing than a performance thing anymore. So I succumbed and entered the race with expectations sagging around my ankles. A good way to go, I think. We added a ringer or two and we have an awesome coxswain, and we did all right. No big droop in the middle of the race, which always sucks in any kind of race. We came in 9th out of 24, respectably in the top of the middle of the pack. Actually, while I'm patting us on the back, only 15 seconds out of the medals, and within 5 percent of the winning time, which guarantees us a spot in next year's event (no need to enter lottery to get in).

Whether that's a good thing remains to be seen.... I will try both to row more next summer and keep my expectations low. You heard it here first, folks. Honestly, aside from a few moments of discomfort, it was a really warm and fuzzy weekend of reunion, hanging out with some very impressive women athletes. Impresive women, period.

So, here it is barely December. I'll see if I can't keep those aliens at bay for the rest of the month.