With two national championships in as many years, the Everett Rowing Association is getting used to taking home title trophies.
The Everett rowing club is trying to make it three years in a row this weekend at the 2010 USRowing Youth National Championships on Harsha Lake outside Cincinnati, where racing begins today and continues through Sunday. Everett qualified four boats with 23 athletes, including a men’s lightweight four with coxswain that is trying to repeat last year’s first-place finish, albeit with a different crew.
Everett also has a lightweight eight in the regatta, and that boat won the 2008 national title.
In fact, six members of this year’s Cincinnati contingent already have won national championships, either last year or in 2008.
“There’s nothing that really describes it,” said Bobby Aikman, an 18-year-old senior at Lake Stevens High School who was in last year’s winning men’s lightweight four. “When you cross the finish line it might not kick in immediately, but it definitely kicks in on the podium when you realize you’re the fastest boat in the nation.”
This year “we’re hoping to go back and get another one,” added Aikman, who is in the lightweight eight.
The feeling “is awesome,” agreed 18-year-old Tucker Keyes of Arlington, who is home-schooled. Keyes, who is making his fourth trip to nationals, was on the winning 2008 lightweight eight crew.
That was the first time an Everett men’s boat won a national championship, “and to be the first one to do it was just unreal,” said Keyes, who is in the same boat this year.
Joining Aikman and Keyes in the lightweight eight are Mackenzie Baker (Kamiak High School), Cole Borseth (Archbishop Murphy), Nikita Cardenas (Everett), Martin Forde (Archbishop Murphy), Austin Overland (Kamiak), Rex Ryman (Archbishop Murphy) and coxswain Joe Stavig (Everett).
Overland, Baker and Cardenas joined Aikman in last year’s winning lightweight four.
Patrick Secor, coach of Everett’s lightweight eight, said his rowers “are on Cloud 9” to be in Cincinnati. “They all just excited and really eager to get on the lake and start practicing.”
Everett also has both a men’s and women’s varsity four in Cincinnati.
The men’s boat includes Austin Bentley (Kamiak), Brandon Thul (Academy Northwest), Michael Tollefsen (Everett), Sam Helms (Snohomish) and coxswain Charles Forrest (Running Start/ Everett CC). Forrest was the coxswain of the lightweight four that won last year’s national title.
The women’s boat includes Natalie Harshman (Stanwood), Amy McKee (Jackson), Emily Osborne (Lakewood) and Brooke Rogers (Everett). The coxswain is Zayin Wall (Archbishop Murphy).
Lastly, Everett has a men’s pair with Alex Engel and Philip Walczak (both Archbishop Murphy).
The men’s spare is Max Frohnen (Archbishop Murphy) and the women’s spare is Amanda Yelle (Snohomish).
Everett readied its crews to contend for nationals with a vigorous offseason training program and a challenging spring schedule. In recent months Everett crews competed at the Head of the Charles Regatta in Boston and the Oakland Invitational at Redwood Shores, Calif.
“They’ve worked so hard throughout the year,” said ERA director Pasha Spencer. “They’ve had some big races … and I think we’re better prepared this year than we’ve been in the past. They’ve been seeing some of the other top crews we’ll see (in Cincinnati).
If there is any disappointment this year, it is that Everett failed to qualify either its men’s or women’s varsity eights at the regional championships in mid-May. Part of that, Spencer explained, was due to the graduation of 26 seniors from last year’s squad.
“We’re a little bit younger and still developing,” Spencer said. “It’s a young team. … But everyone is coming back next year and we’ll be ready to go.”
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