First it was the rains, and now the winds...

Well, the rain has been holding off lately, but it seems we've exchanged the rain for high winds. NOW I know why sailing is so popular here! Despite the really rough water and strong winds, we've only cancelled one class's practice and the rowers have done a spectacular job rowing in the chop. I know of a lot of experienced crews that wouldn't have even tried and our folks just kept on going. Great stuff! Bring on the Charles Basin on a bad day - we're not afraid!!

Our next session of classes will begin the week of August 16th, and by then we should be in our new location. Details will follow, so stay tuned. The class times will all remain the same.

Exciting Practices

Well, the last couple of days have been exciting. Monday's Youth Learn-To-Row had some really rough winds and seas, and got blown around on the water quite a bit. Just trying to get through the bridge was an epic feat. With just 6 kids in the boat, they did a spectacular job, although we did lose a skeg in the battle. The Youth Skills Development class that meets after the LTR didn't get to go out so we'll be making up that practice.

Yesterday's Adult classes also saw some excitement. The Skills Development class went out in a four with coach Briana, while the Learn-To-Row class went in an 8 with me and coach Brian. The four caught a crab and tipped enough to fill with water, although didn't flip. Luckily they were near the shore and the weather was good. The smaller launch can't fit more than 2 people in it, so Brian had to fish the rowers out and take them back to the dock in the larger launch. We towed the four in, and luckily no major damage was done. We didn't even lose the skeg! Just some scratches from the oyster beds when it drifted to shore while the rowers were being brought to the dock. Figures that this was the day that local photographer Steve Hopkins came out to shoot some photos!

Exciting practices for us here for sure, but so far we've been blessed with zero injuries and only minor damage. The coaches have been great and even when things are getting a little hairy they keep their cool. So do the rowers! Through it all, we're still having a blast :)

Bristol County Savings Bank

Here's the professional photo of our wonderful donation from the Bristol County Savings Charitable Foundation. They supported several different programs that day, and we were very honored to be among the recipients.

The 6 people on the ends are people that run the bank and/or serve on their board. The dapper and rather tall gent in the middle is our very own Bruce Smith (Executive Director at Community Rowing in Brighton).

Last Week of Session II

This week we have the last one for the Session II classes. Our next session will begin the week of August 9th (sign up now!) and we expect to have many returnees from the Learn-To-Row classes. We've had a great bunch of rowers this session and several of them are people that have rowed at some point in their past. With each stroke they take, you can see them remember bits and pieces and they progress really quickly. The teams this fall should be great!

So far all of the programs have really liked the 4+ we had delivered last week. We've also gotten some new oars from Simmons College and they are pretty popular as well. Great stuff happening down here in New Bedford, even the little things :)

There could be a location change for us this week - we're still looking into it. If we do change locations, I'm sure we'll be quick and efficient and not lose any class time. No worries - we're pros!

Plans for the Fall

Plans are underway for not just the programming for the upcoming Fall season, but also for a big party we're going to have! Yep, that's right - on Thursday September 9th in the evening, we'll be hosting a Kickoff Event here in New Bedford. The location is still to be confirmed, but there will be food & beverages, entertainment, speakers, and lots of rowing talk. More information will be sent and posted soon, so stay tuned!

Next week is our last week of the July sessions, and we'll have a few make up days the first week of August (thanks a lot, rain...) but then we launch our next session the week of August 9th. Check our new website to register!!

www.newbedfordcommunityrowing.org

Lots of guests

Tuesday night's practice was a great one. We not only had a 4+ and some more oars delivered (thanks AJ) in the afternoon, but we had several guest coaches come check things out. Brian DeDominici returned, as well as Briana Blood, and Mohammed Jafri - all from the Boston area. Both the Learn-To-Row and the Skills Development classes did several different drills and both classes seemed to progress pretty well as a result. And the four was a big hit!

We also discovered that our cox vox is a rather unique one. Like many cox boxes out there, ours works sometimes rather than all the time. However, what our cox vox does that I have never heard of any other doing, is that it picks up a local radio station! That's right - when put into one of our 8's, Fun 107 streams through our speakers! Crazy.... but hey, I'm sure the rowers would prefer music to a coxswain barking orders at them.

Last night we had the kids groups and while the Learn-To-Row is a small class, they are doing really really well. They also went out in the four and really liked it, even though it's more tippy than the bigger boats. Trying to dock in the afternoon without someone to help catch us proved to be pretty much impossible, though. Luckily the Skills Development class is right after the Learn-To-Row, so the first ones to show up had to catch us. Darn that wind!

The Skills class had a rather short practice. We've got a really tall guy that was hitting the front of the slides AND the back of them! We tried moving the foot stretchers and even the slides, but it didn't help so we cut our losses, changed seats and launched. An hour into rowing...thunder! We saw some lightening so we high tailed it back to the dock. Luckily Briana was there as well as Rachel Coogan so landing wasn't so hard. We managed to get off the water before the rains began, thankfully.

Today Brian was back for the Adult classes and we had the four out with some women that row a similar style and they did fantastic in it! They were even rowing by all 4 in pretty bad chop. The winds were really high and the water was very rough but that didn't stop them!! Looks like I'll have some racers this fall after all...muahahhaaaaaa >: )

Fantastic Morning!!

Today we were joined by Brian DeDominici (a coach from the Boston area) for our morning adult programs. He took the Skills Development class out and did a lot of drills with them. They looked great! He brings a lot of experience and fun to the table, so the group seemed to really enjoy being coached by him.

I had the Learn-To-Row group, but I almost feel like that's not an appropriate way to describe them. Several people have some sort of rowing in their past, so the more strokes we took the more they remembered. They were amazing! We got up to rowing by 6's on the feather and it was only their second time on the water!! I was utterly impressed with them and hope they all stick around for the competitive teams in the fall. If they do....our competition should be very very nervous!

Dollahs!

This morning the Bristol County Savings Bank awarded New Bedford Community Rowing (through Community Rowing Incorporated in Brighton) a $5000 charitable grant! It was a great event and we mingled with some interesting folks doing great things for the New Bedford Community.

Mayor Scott Lang was there as well as Bruce Smith from CRI. It was videotaped and still photos were taken, so hopefully you'll see it on your cable access channel and in the paper. Once we're able to get a copy of the official photograph with those amazing people at the bank, we'll post it. Not only here, but also on Facebook AND our new website!! www.newbedfordcommunityrowing.org We're very lucky and very excited for this grant to allow us to continue putting out boats and bringing social change to New Bedford.

Now...if the rain, thunder and lightening would just go away.......

First week of new classes complete

So we've made it through our first week of classes for the second session. With a few bumps along the way, it's been pretty successful. The numbers were low for the youth Learn-To-Row, but we had more adults come out than expected. Jim Papas who brought his son Alex down, had his own interest piqued and ended up coming the next day to the adult class...and brought 3 other people!

So far, numbers have been our Achilles, for both rowers signing up for the classes and also coaching staff. But good news!! Briana Blood and Brian DeDomenici - both coaches from Community Rowing up in Brighton - have come aboard to help! They are both experienced coaches and will bring a lot to the rowers they instruct. Brian will be helping through the summer around his already busy schedule, but will return to his high school teams in the fall. Briana will help through the summer and hopefully be on board with our competitive teams in the fall. I'm very excited to work with them both.

Hopefully the rain will all fall out of the clouds over the weekend so we can have some dry class days next week. But you know us - even if it doesn't, the rain won't stop us!

Rain, Rain, Go Away

Well, for the past two days, the rain has really put a wrench in the works. Tuesday, we got away with the morning adult group classes. I took the Learn-To-Row group of 6 while coach Will took the Skills Development class out for his last day with us for the next 3 weeks. He'll be away at Semester At Sea - something he did as a student previously, but is now a deckhand. Good luck to him, but we're sure to miss him at the docks!

The evening class was however met with some hard rain. Of course the rain didn't appear until just as class was starting, but the evening Skills Development class did get an 8+ down from the racks and into slings, so that coaches Will, Paige, Victoria and I could show the Learn-To-Row class the equipment. While huddling under the tent for the safety video and other information, Will actually enjoys playing in the rain, so we all nominated him to point out the parts of the boat while we watched from the protection of the tent. The rain was strong but it was the lightening that had us send the Skills Development class home and we'll schedule a make up day for them. Rowers are tough and will go out in the rain, but the aluminum riggers on the boat tend to attract those pesky lightening bolts.

Yesterday, we were also met with rain for the Youth classes. Of course, the rain only starts when we're about to! The Learn-To-Row class had a few extra people show up, including Shane Brumley from the Skills Development class, who was a little confused on the class time. But it was great to have him in the boat to help out. Victoria was there and she coxed the boat. While just a small class, the kids did fantastic!! They were rowing on the feather on the first day and seemed to be having fun despite the rain.

Next up came the Skills class, and the rain started to wane a bit. Thinking we'd be in good shape for a dry class, we sent out a boat with 2 of the kids actually asking to cox!! Nora Scaduto and Dylan Maciel were both interested in trying it out, and both did really well figuring out how to steer the boat without having to be told. As usual though, our wonderful Dylan (A.K.A. princess) had more equipment issues so we had to stop a few times while he sorted things out. Oh, and don't you know that as soon as we launched from the dock, the rain kicked back up. The kids persevered through the rough weather and we even had Rex Carr from the Learn-To-Row class stick around for the Skills class (since Paige and Victoria, my fantastic helpers, are his sisters and thus how he gets home). Rex was a rockstar on his first day doing the stand-up drill, and trying to keep up with kids that have rowed weeks longer than he has.

Victoria wasn't quite prepared for the rain, and only had shorts on so the poor girl was freezing, but even though I had rain gear from head to toe, I discovered that my "waterproof" clothing was no such thing. At the end of class, a lot of the kids were asking about details for the racing team in the fall rather than complaining about being soaked - that's a great sign!

This morning the rain couldn't quite decide if it wanted to pick on us, so it just sort of drizzled off and on. We had both the Adult Learn-To-Row class as well as the Adult Skills Development class, but just one coach (me). The only option was to combine the two classes and work on basics. The Skills class had just 7 people, so it was good to have the Learn-To-Rowers, but it meant a lot of sitting out by everyone. Bonnie Lippencott graciously offered to cox, which was a huge help. We had 6 'newbies' and just traded out 4 people at a time in the middle of the boat. The Skills folks were very patient and Gary Schyuler (seated between 2 newbies) even helped to explain a few things throughout the class. Although it wasn't ideal not getting to row the whole time, riding in the launch proved to be fruitful as the rowers, new and returning alike, could see the various habits and body positions of those rowing. Lots of good questions were asked and when the time came to switch, I think they had a good idea of what to do and what to try to avoid.

Tonight I'll have Victoria for the early group, and Paige will be there for the later group. We also have Briana Blood, a coach up at CRI in Boston, trying to make it as she'll hopefully be coaching with us soon. Funny how work gets in the way of rowing, though. Cross your fingers that Briana can get off work in time, and that the rain holds off!

Good Rowing Is Hard To Find?

Yesterday was a very exciting day, having the demo at New Bedford High School and then new programs starting up. The demo went well, although it was hot and therefore hard for the kids not to get distracted. But we did get some sign ups and some even said they'd come down for the first day of our new Learn-To-Row. Carrie Cetnich, Dean of Students at New Bedford HS even got on the erg! She did fantastic, by the way.

We were looking forward to having such a large Learn-To-Row class, with 18 signed up and hopefully a few new recruits from the morning, but had a rather disappointing showing of attendees. Only 4 kids showed up! So perhaps the location was hard to find, or the day/time got mixed up. Whatever the case may be, hopefully we can get those interested kids out on the water after all.

The Youth Skills Development class was missing a few people but we had enough to send out a full 8+ and we did the "stand-up" drill. Cleverly, this is where the rowers stand up in the boat to focus on really using their legs, rather than pulling first. (So I have to work on names for my drills....) The rowing improved dramatically after that drill!! They were really moving the boat well and I was very proud of my puppies :) Even the broken seat was worth the gained improvement.....

This morning we had all 6 of our adult Learn-To-Rowers show up and they seem like a great group - 2 people have already rowed in the past! Our Adult Skills Development was missing a few people so they went out as a 6 but did just great, according to coach Will Mahoney. They didn't need anyone setting the boat and rowed by all 6 for the majority of the practice. Several of the women even traded out the job of coxing to keep it fair.

Tonight we have our second group of Adult Learn-To-Row as well as Skills Development so it's not too late to sign up! Email or call: carolyn@communityrowing.org or 508.717.4013

New Classes Start This Week!

So this week is a big one for us at New Bedford Community Rowing. Today, Carolyn McGonagle and J.P. Hogan are going to do a demo to 70 kids at New Bedford High School (the same demo we did in the spring to introduce our sport). After that, it's time to head over to the Seaport Inn & Marina because we have a Youth Learn-To-Row class starting at 3, and then a Youth Skills Development class from 5-7. Both classes are FULL so it'll be a lot of kids and a lot of fun.

Then tomorrow, we've got all the adult programs. We have morning and evening classes filling up for both Learn-To-Row and Skills Development. We also have a few volunteers helping the coaching staff and boy are they great to have! Paige and Victoria Carr, and Rachel Coogan have worked us into their schedules this summer to help keep things running smoothly (thanks!) and they are all great to work with.

Event Success!

We had lots of people come by the Seaport Inn on Saturday. I'd guesstimate that we had between 30 & 50 people, but they came and went throughout the day so it's hard to know. We even had an 8+ go out with some of our rowers. We had some of the non-rowers (so far....they'll get sucked in soon enough!) sit in the boat and go for a ride with us!

They all had a good time, and rowers were able to bring friends and family to see what our equipment is like and learn a little about our sport. We had Ryan Banks come down from Boston and show the CRI love, as well as Chandra Claycamp, a former rower that is considering getting back into it up in Boston. Pat Ball came down early and made sure the grounds were neat and cleaned up and as usual, she was recruiting anyone that hadn't signed up for a class yet.

The weather was warm, but the rain held off until the very end of the party and since we were under a tent, it was a welcome cool breeze. A few of the people that came by decided to sign up for the programs that start this coming week. Right now we have 10 people signed up for both the morning and evening Adult Skills Development classes, and a total of about 9 for the Learn To Row, but between 2 classes. We may combine the two if others don't show. For the kids, we have 12 signed up for the Skills Development class and 18 for the Learn To Row. Great numbers for our second round of classes!

All the fun stuff

So now that we've wrapped up all of our June Learn-To-Row classes, it's time to prepare for our Appreciation Party tomorrow, and also get all the registrations for the new classes ready. We'll have Learn-To-Row classes for both Youth and Adult as well as Skills Development classes for both. They all kick off next week and run for 3 weeks.

So far we have about 18 (yes!! 18!) kids signed up for the Learn-To-Row class from 3-5pm on Mondays and Wednesdays, and 11 kids returning to take the Skills Development class. I'm pretty happy with that number because several of the ones that aren't returning are traveling - not because they didn't like it. Some will come back in August, and some will be back in the fall ready to join the competitive team. So even though I'd hoped for more returning, I'm happy with 11, and certainly with the 18!

For the adult side of things, we have about 9 returnees for both the morning and the evening classes! That's a really good return rate as well. There are a few that aren't continuing but a lot of it has to do with scheduling. The adults seem really excited and they're a blast to work with.

For the adult Learn-To-Row classes, we're a little light. There were a few people planning to come and then something came up and they had to back out, which is a bummer. There are currently 3 confirmed for both the morning and the evening but one morning person may have 4 others coming with him. The issue is that there aren't shower facilities and they need to be at work soon after class. Hopefully they can make it work. There is also another group of about 9 women that have been expressing interest since May but I can't seem to get confirmation from them. So they could show and make the class more than full - crossing fingers!

So this Saturday will be a fun time to mix and mingle with rowers, family and friends. Then on Monday JP Hogan and I will be doing a demo at New Bedford High School for 70 kids, and then I'll head on over to the Seaport Inn for our 3:00 class! We've been lucky to find Will Mahoney who has been coaching this summer and is great. He's brought several friends into the mix and while Will is away at Semester At Sea for 3 weeks, 2 of his friends from St. Mark's - Paige and Victoria Carr - will be helping out.

Lots happening in the next week - come check it out! Seaport Inn & Marina @ 110 Middle Street in Fairhaven.

My Rowers ROCK

So we had our last class for our morning adult Learn-To-Row today and they were awesome. We had exactly 9 people show up (I love it when the numbers work out) and Patrick Kielty came to check things out again. Patrick even got in the boat to cox!! (He's NOT short, folks)

We had a great practice, and did the stand-up drill. The idea of standing straight up in the boat was met with skepticism as expected, but they got it and performed the drill very well. Then we had them progress onto rowing by ALL 8 ON THE FEATHER! It was a sort of 'graduation' and they all earned their figurative tassel.

We've got lots of people signing up for the next class so they'll just keep getting better and better. They're moving along pretty well and by the time we form teams, they'll be fantastic!

Saturday July 10th

So we're having a party. Yep, that's right - rowers like to party as much as they like to row. So on Saturday July 10th we're going to have a little shin-dig down at the Seaport Inn & Marina at 110 Middle Street in Fairhaven. Yes, it's a hotel, but it's much more than that. It's our current home and where we launch our boats from.

For the party, we may take a boat or two out so any of you that don't know what our sport is like, come check it out. There will be food, drinks and music along with some great people to mix and mingle with.

Now all we need is for the weather to cooperate......

Adult Class - PM

Tonight we had a great class. Exactly 9 people showed up, and Nancy even volunteered to cox. She didn't have to be told to steer once! The 8 rowers did fantastic and made some great strides. They even rowed by ALL 8 ON THE FEATHER!! Oh, and this was their FOURTH day on the water. Ever. Impressive, yes? I think so.

Coach Kit was there tonight, and we had a visitor - UMass Amherst rower, Patrick Kielty. He chimed in and tried some pause drills with the group and the result was the best quote of the day: "Coaching is hard!". Unfortunately he'll be moving in a week to take a new job, but he liked what he saw and wants to stay connected, since he's from Fairhaven.

We've got some great rowers and they're doing an amazing job picking up the sport. The morning group is equally as impressive and I'm very excited for the progress they can make.

Good stuff, people!!

My First Post

Well, now that I've been educated within FIVE MINUTES by the amazing Bruce, you will all benefit from my adventures.

Things have been going great down in New Bedford and the programs are alive and well. Of course there are hiccups along the way, but that's what keeps it all interesting. We have already run 2 classes of youth Learn-To-Rows with several of the kids wanting to keep rowing. We have 2 adult programs that will finish this week and both have had great attendance. The next batch of classes will begin the week of July 12th.

We'll have an Appreciation Party on Saturday July 10th to say thanks to those that helped get us off the ground, as well as for those that took a chance and came out on the water with us. There will be food and drinks at the party, and if we have 2 full 8's worth of rowers, a little race! We'll be at the Seaport Inn & Marina from noon - 4pm so come by! (110 Middle Street in Fairhaven)

Stay tuned, as there is much more to come!

Teaching Carolyn How to Blog!

So, here it is - we're sitting by the River PROVING that learning how to blog takes FIVE MINUTES!!!

We just logged in at www.newbedfordcommunityrowing.blogspot.com, signed in using our nifty google sign-in privileges, and started posting (after we found the "new post" button!).

And we're stopping the stopwatch at THREE MINUTES so we have time for coffee, on top of learning how to blog.

This is really exciting because every day, we'll all get an update from Carolyn and we'll have a great record of all the work and energy that goes into starting a new rowing venture.