Wharton Crew: Confessions of a Crew Club Officer

By: Amritha Kasthurirangan, WG'05

Posted: 4/11/05

Research Associate Amritha Kasthurirangan prepared this case as the basis for class discussion rather than to illustrate either effective or ineffective handling of an administrative situation.

"Stop the boat!"
"Weigh enough!"
"Mother of God, square your blades NOW!"
The boat shuddered to a halt just ahead of the foot of the bridge and the crew exhaled. It was a damp, nippy morning on the Schuylkill and we had been rowing until our fingers were numb and our toes mere soggy lumps in our sodden shoes. For perhaps the hundredth time, I wondered what had possessed the nine of us, coxswain (1) included, to sit in the rain and pretend we liked it.

Fall 2004: The Beginning - Learn-to-Row
I looked at the faces of the new recruits and wondered what they were thinking. It was 5:45a.m., long before 9:00a.m. lectures and they had been instructed to meet at the boat house for an early-morning practice. Like all "novice" practices, this would entail an hour of ritualistically freezing on the river while learning to pull an oar through the water. Our coxes, diminutive but stalwart MBAs, were nervously awaiting the point at which they would be thrust at the helm of a 60-feet-long craft, manned entirely by half-asleep rowers they were expected to control by yelling.

Our coach, the earnest, bespectacled young JJ Lenhart (WG '05), whom the club had acquired in a moment of rare good fortune, was instructing the novice men. They auspiciously launched off the docks and almost immediately ran into trouble. A pugnacious log drifted towards them and snapped a rigger (2) as though it were a twig. Hastily turning around and heading back to the shore, the crew was then forced aground by an evil-minded current and the boat's rudder (3) violently sheared off. An ashen-faced coach and cox tottered up the docks to greet me with the good news. Stifling a scream as I envisioned boat repair costs and the club's threadbare budget, I managed to assure them that everything would be alright, in the grand tradition of crew club officers everywhere.

Winter 2004: Competitive Landscape - Racing
Cox Eric Navales (WG '05) was beside himself. His crew was beating a competing team from Greenwich (average age: 53). They were one seat ahead of the other boat! They were maintaining their lead! They were two seats ah-what the hell was that?

Like the gates of hell opening loose, Eric saw one of his rowers take what looked to him like the feeblest stroke in the history of rowing. The next instant, her blade was wrenched out of her hands by the momentum of the boat and sucked underwater, its handle flying overhead and knocking her sprawling backwards into the boat. The wretched woman had "caught a crab!" (4)

A couple of hours later, I staggered into my bed and pulled the sheets over my head. I felt small and very incompetent.

Spring 2005: Breaking the Boundaries - Spring Training
"In Germany, twelve- and fourteen-year-old girls regularly pull this weight before breakfast"

He was standing above me and looking disdainfully down at the weight I was attempting to lift. His name was Iradj and he was a German ex-national team rower, and our newest coach. His aspirations for us were Olympian and his dedication intense. Unfortunately, he was faced with talent so raw it reeked.

Undeterred by the sagging physiques he was confronted with, Iradj mounted a fearsome campaign to whip the club into shape and infuse us with the Olympian spirit. Training began with a one-hour lesson on the physics of rowing, followed by instructions on how to sit on the erg (5), and continued in the weight room, where his interactions with the club membership reminded me of lion tamer acts at the circus.

Iradj (firmly to rower): "This weight is not enough for you. You need more."
Female rower (equally firmly): "No."
Iradj: "Yes!"
Rower: "No!"

There was also the Enlightenment of Wharton Crew on the water, courtesy of our new German champion. Every weekday morning, crews on the Schuylkill would be treated to the sight of a Wharton boat enthusiastically pounding the waves, followed closely by a tiny launch, out of which a voice would reverberate:
"Hello? Hello? Focus! Am I speaking Chinese?"
"Nein!"
"Number Two! Are you wearing gloves? Take them off! You do not need gloves unless the river is frozen!"
We were en route to great things...

April 16th, 2005: Cash Out -Wharton Regatta
Darden, our long-standing rivals had promised they would attend. Cornell and Yale were returning. Tiny Tuck had cobbled together a team and Sloan was coming after a year-long hiatus. Even Harvard, the grand-daddy of them all, was descending from Boston and from across the pond, Oxford had written to request details.
Anne Friedrich (WG '06), the fluffy-haired new Club President, pondered the regatta. Would Wharton be ready in time? How would the novices perform? She hoped the river wouldn't flood...
The truth would be revealed on April 16th, on Boathouse Row.

Footnotes:
(1) Little person who sits in front of the rowers and steers the boat.
(2) Metal part that holds the oars in place.
(3) Fin for steering the boat.
(4) Term used for when a rower's oar gets sucked under the boat and the rower falls backwards.
(5) Rowing machines.