The Eastern Michigan University women’s rowing team traveled to Oak Ridge, Tenn., to compete in the Oak Ridge Cardinal Invitational March 16-17 at Melton Hill Lake.
The event included morning and afternoon races on Saturday and morning races on Sunday. The Eagles raced on the 2,000-meter course with a varsity 8 , a second varsity 8 and a varsity 4 .
The Eagles started the event on a rough note and were unable to pass their opponents. The varsity boat posted at 7 minutes, 25.90 seconds, which was slower than the boats from Duke University and University of Louisville.
“We trained just as hard as we usually do but [were] still a little tired from our week in Clemson, [which] definitely had an impact on the results,” EMU senior Hannah Keener said.
The varsity boat was almost 10 seconds slower than the previous day when they took on the University of Dayton and the University of Kansas on Sunday.
“The races were a little less crisp than we would have liked,” Keener said.
The 2V8 boat was about a minute slower than their competition on Saturday when they posted a 7:56.50, but closed the gap more when they raced Kansas and Dayton the following day.
The varsity four boat coxed by EMU freshman Tauan Jeffrey marked a 8:54.90 on Saturday behind Louisville (7:34.20) and Duke (7:38.20).
The boat slowed down significantly when it came to racing on Sunday against Kansas.
“We are still trying to find our groove,” Keener said. “But with so many new rowers as a part of our team, that will definitely take a little bit of time.”
The 1V4 included EMU freshman LeAnn Dimitroff, Stephanie Schlosser, Rebecca Sear and Emily Burks on Saturday, and a lineup change the following day resulted in freshman Claire Hester being in the boat instead of Schlosser.
“We expect that with each of our upcoming races, we will continue to improve in overall time, technical execution of the stroke and in overall confidence,” Keener said.
The Eagles will soon travel a shorter distance when they head to Bloomington, Ind., March 30 to compete in a scrimmage against the Indiana University Hoosiers and the University of Dayton Flyers.
