Rowers return to UCLA team roster
By Daily Bruin Staff
May 20, 2001 9:00 p.m.
 Daily Bruin File Photo The UCLA Women’s crew team wakes
up before the break of dawn to practive every morning.
By Scott Schultz
Daily Bruin Staff
When the women’s crew team hits the water at Marina Del
Rey for practice each morning, it’s still dark outside.
It’s too early to even buy coffee at Starbucks. The morning
newspapers have yet to be delivered. The sea spray is cool on a May
morning, but it’s brutal in January. They begin their
practice wearing sweatshirts and they finish in tank tops.
“They say rowers consume more oxygen than (athletes in)
any other sport,” said Novice Team Coach Sara-Mai Conway.
Aside from a gray-haired surfer paddling around and a pair of
dolphins enjoying breakfast, there’s not a lot of activity in
the channel where the rowers will exert themselves for the next two
hours, perfecting their technique.
The club team, which will become an official varsity team next
season, has practice at 5:30 each morning, six days a week,
year-round. However, the solitude of the channel at dawn is one of
the allures of the sport.
“It’s kind of cool to see the sun rise at six in the
morning while watching your breath leave your body into the crisp
air of Marina Del Rey,” sophomore Kathy Kennedy said.
At one time, UCLA had been among the top women’s crew
teams in the country, but in 1991 the varsity squad was dropped
from the UCLA athletic roster due to financial constraints within
the athletic department. The team continued competing against
Pac-10 varsity squads, but they participated as a club team. The
rowers were rewarded for their hard work with nothing except the
natural exhilaration that sports can provide.
The women’s crew team will return to the UCLA athletic
roster after a 10-year hiatus, in compliance with Title IX
regulations from the Civil Rights Act of 1972. Title IX requires
equal funding for women’s and men’s sports in
accordance to the student enrollment ratios.
As a club team, the Bruins were not only unable to offer
scholarships, tutoring or priority scheduling, they were also
unable to replace old and broken equipment. For the past decade,
the team has consisted entirely of walk-ons who joined the club out
of curiosity.
“It says something for the team, that none of us were
recruited,” freshman Mitra Tabidian said. “We’re
all here because we want to do it.”
All the members have had to endure yearly dues of $480, which
subsidizes the cost of their share of the boathouse and their
meager supply of used boats and oars. If you include the costs of
their sweats and other necessities, the rowers spent close to $800
per year out of their own pockets to compete in the sport.
When it officially becomes a sanctioned team next season, the
squad will begin receiving the same benefits that other
student-athletes on UCLA varsity teams do.
“We’ll get better provisions for rowing,”
senior Delia Lucas said. “I’ve had to deal with bad
boats and oars for three years, so next season will be special.
We’ll also get access to the athlete’s computer lab,
tutors, priority scheduling, along with all the other perks of the
athletic department.”
Most rowers don’t usually take to the sport until entering
college. However, the team is composed of athletes who either
joined the team out of curiosity or were former high school
athletes who wanted to continue a rigorous physical regimen while
attending school.
Freshman Laurel Turbin was a high school tennis player who
turned to rowing as a way to defend her body against the stagnant
lifestyle of dormitory living, but she admits waking up at 4:30
every morning takes its toll on the rowers individually and as a
team.
“I’m not a morning person, so it’s really hard
to wake up early and maintain grades and everything,” Turbin
said. “Sometimes, because it’s early in the morning,
people are grouchy or in a bad mood.”
Lucas says that the early morning practice schedule is the
element of the sport that causes most of the curiosity seekers to
quit the team.
Lucas cited the early mornings as reasons that the team shrank
from 90 members in September to the 20 who currently row.
“The mental discipline is definitely the most difficult
aspect,” she said.
The team expects it will take at least a couple years until the
Bruins to return to the upper echelon of the Pac-10, a conference
that includes some of the best crew teams in the country, including
USC, Oregon, Cal and Washington. In order to get to that level, the
Bruins will have to choose full-time coaches and build the squad
through recruitment.
However, for the immediate future, the rowers are just grateful
that the athletic department is granting them varsity status.
“It’s really exciting, because we put in as much
time practicing as any team on campus,” Tabidian said.
“We spend so much time on the water and in the weight room.
We’ll finally get the recognition for the work we put
in.”
