North
Allegheny rowers headed to Amsterdam
Jerry Clark
Sports Editor
Thursday, June 29, 2006
After winning three races
at the Junior National Trials, three North Allegheny rowers have earned the right to
compete in the Junior World Championships in
"They were tight
races," said Don Heckenstaller,"
Brittany Kelly, Erin Dauson
and Brianna Pittman of North Allegheny, along with fellow Steel City rower Suzanne
Maddamma won their first two races by three and two seconds respectively. But, to qualify
for the World Championships, they needed to reach the mandated Junior Worlds qualifying
time by five seconds -- a feat they accomplished.
As if winning three tough
races was not impressive enough, this marks the first time
"This is a big
deal," Heckenstaller said.
The team has about five
weeks to prepare and will be working out twice a day for about three hours.
"We want to be
prepared," Heckenstaller said. "We will stick to our usual routines, we'll just
increase the intensity."
The team will compete in
the sculling event and hope to make the finals and earn a medal for their efforts.
"Just to make the
finals is a big deal for us," Heckenstaller said. "The good thing is three of
the four rowers are juniors, so they will gain good experience to build on for next
year."
Kelly is the lone senior in
the boat.
Heckenstaller said since
there is no way to know if the team will qualify for the World Championships, the time to
raise funds is limited, so the team is asking the community for a hand.
Anyone interested in
donating to the team's trip fund can send donations to the North Allegheny Rowing
Association,
The team will also hold
some fund-raising events of their own.
Altogether the
All sculling boats were
chosen at the