London Olympics

Post # 100

Oakland, California - I've always said that one of the things I love most about rowing is surprising myself.  Achieving things that I didn't think were possible keeps the sport exciting and keeps me coming back for more.  In this 100th post on my ITA blog, I could not be happier to have surprised myself and achieved my dream of making the Olympic team.


Thinking back to our race in the final, all the countries were extremely fast and aggressive right from the start.  When I looked across to give Julie updates on where we were compared to everyone else, it was often too close to call.  We both knew it was going to be an absolute fight to the line.  I looked over with about 10 strokes to go and saw that we were only inches ahead of GB and Denmark in lanes five and six.  Our top four requirement to make the Olympic team came down to the last stroke of the race.

The scene with about 5-10 strokes to go.  China, NZ, and Greece are up (on the left), we're in the foreground, and GB and Denmark are in the background, fighting it out with us.

We crossed the finish line and I just kept saying to Julie, "I don't know, I don't know if we got it." We stared at the jumbotron, waiting for the results, and when they finally came up and we saw that we did it, it was just pure joy.  I don't think you've ever seen two people so happy to get fourth place. It was only after we did a cool down and were back on land that we realized just how close it was - we grabbed fourth place by just 0.09 seconds over fifth.

Waiting to see this at the finish line

The video of the race is here (I realize the link in the previous post didn't work in the US, whoops) which is also posted in the "Media & Links" tab. 

The cool down: "Did that really just happen?!"

Now we're back in California and back to work.  Getting back into our normal training routine feels good, especially after so many races (each of which were just a couple weeks apart).  The fact that we're going to the Olympics hasn't quite hit me yet, and I don't think it will for another few days or maybe a couple weeks.  It still feels like a dream.  Regardless, our only plans between now and London are to get as fast as we can, day by day, stroke by stroke. 

Big congrats to the US Women's eight, who grabbed gold by an even tighter margin than ours: 0.03 seconds over Canada.  Talk about a photo finish! The US women's pair won silver and the women's quad won bronze to cap off a great day of racing.

I am extremely excited to cheer on the other ITA summer athletes as they progress toward Olympic qualification.  Former ITA athlete Sara Groff will be there in the triathalon, and my hope is that we'll have even more ITA-ers representing the US in London.