PG North: Interest in crew born anew

Thursday, July 06, 2006

By Michael Phillips, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

After lying low for 150 years, the sport of rowing is making a comeback in the Pittsburgh area.

Colleges have had teams for years, but recently high schools have begun to get into the game as well, reviving a sport that was popular in the mid-1800s.

Almost all Western Pennsylvania schools that have teams row out of the Three Rivers Rowing Association, which has its main boathouse on Washington's Landing. That boathouse had been full for some time, so when the association opened a new facility in Millvale, it gave more high schools the opportunity to field teams -- and that is exactly what happened.

	Darrell Sapp, Post-Gazette Morning breaks over rowers working out on the Allegheny River near Washington's Landing.

"We were projecting that this would be sufficient for as many as 10 years, but we're only three years in and the new boathouse will probably be full in a couple of years," said Mike Lambert, former director of the association.

With the facility problem solved, the other obstacle for schools looking to start a program is cost. The sport is not sanctioned by the WPIAL, and there are significant equipment costs involved, which means that often students who wish to row must pay a fee to be on a team.

North Allegheny girls' coach Don Heckenstaller, however, said the sport has become so popular, he had to rethink his policy of not cutting athletes.

"A few years ago, we got up to about 100 rowers," he said. "But then we needed to start having cuts, because it was just too many people. Now we try to keep it down to about 60."

The trend extends beyond just Pittsburgh. While Boston and Philadelphia have had established programs for years, smaller cities are beginning to get in on the action as well. The National Federation of State High School Associations reported that about 200 students participated in sanctioned rowing in 1988. Two years ago, that number had grown to more than 90,000.

Pittsburgh's biggest event, the Head of the Ohio regatta, attracted 90 teams of various skill levels to the Allegheny River last September.

"When we first started, I think there were six high schools in the area [participating]. Now there are many more," said Heckenstaller, who has been coaching at North Allegheny for about 12 years.

At season's end, 21 Pittsburgh-area schools had rowing programs at the Three Rivers Rowing Association.

"I think there were just a couple of kids who wanted to start rowing, and someone volunteered to start the team," Heckenstaller said of the North Allegheny team's humble beginnings.

Yet the high school boom has not translated into a surge in participation at the college level.

Locally, only Duquesne has a varsity women's rowing team. Pitt and Carnegie Mellon offer club crew teams for women, and all three schools have crew teams for men.

For women, it is easier to find opportunities to row in college for a scholarship, because many schools use women's rowing as a way to balance out the gender ratio problem that a football team creates.

"It's surprising that Pitt doesn't have a varsity team, but they must not need it to meet the Title IX requirements," Heckenstaller said.

He said that of the 12 rowers who graduated from North Allegheny last year, nine are competing at the collegiate level.

At Duquesne, the problem is finding enough women to fill a complete varsity roster. For coach Katie Kirsten, that means recruiting women with no rowing experience.

"We have about 60 girls try out every year with no experience, and about half of them stay," she said. "We really don't make any cuts unless they don't make it to practice."

While being on a varsity squad may be seen by some as more prestigious, Kirsten said that in rowing the distinction isn't as important, as varsity teams operate similar to club teams, having to raise funds for support.

At Carnegie Mellon, the rowing team met with the administration, but ultimately decided to leave the program as is.

"When you jump to the varsity level, there are all sorts of NCAA rules about when you can practice," said team president Adam Suhy.

At the Division III level, teams are allowed only 19 weeks of training time each year. There also are restrictions on the numbers of hours per week that teams can practice. Currently, the Carnegie Mellon team trains throughout the school year.

"A lot of clubs are interested in the varsity status, but they have to understand the limitations that come with that," said Carnegie Mellon athletic director Susan Bassett.

Kirsten, Duquesne's coach, said that regardless of affiliation, all of the schools competed against each other at regattas and tournaments, and the varsity teams did not always fare better than the club teams.

"It's really just what the school wants," she said.

"Pitt has a very large and competitive program, as does Carnegie Mellon, and they do very well competing against other schools. I don't think in rowing you can take affiliation into account."

The coaches said the biggest reason to have a varsity program was the scholarship implications for female athletes. Lambert added that he saw the biggest growth at the collegiate level with the addition of Title IX.

"Many of the colleges have seen that, as far as gender equity goes, they can get a pretty large bang for their buck with rowing," he said.

Row, row, row ...

The following area schools rowed out of the Three Rivers Rowing Association during the 2005-06 school year. North Allegheny rows out of the Groveton Boat Club. Other schools had combined teams or had students who participated on various club teams.

Here are some schools that rule the waves: Avonworth, Baldwin, Creative and Performing Arts, Central Catholic, Chartiers Valley, Ellis, Fox Chapel, Hampton, Imani Christian Academy, Mt. Lebanon, North Catholic, Oakland Catholic, Perry, Pine-Richland, Schenley, Seneca Valley, Seton-La Salle, Taylor Allderdice, Quaker Valley, Upper St. Clair, Westinghouse.

(Michael Phillips can be reached at mphillips@post-gazette.com or (412) 263-1012. )