Course Correction
Page 1
Yale University’s first national championship women’s crew, 1979 (from left to right): stroke Mary O’Connor, Anne Boucher, Elaine Mathies, Cathy Pew, Ginny Gilder, Lisa Laverty, Sally Fisher, bow Jane Kraus, and coxswain Joyce Frocks. Courtesy Yale Athletics Department.
Course Correction
A Story of Rowing and Resilience in the Wake of Title IX
Ginny Gilder
Beacon Press
BOSTON
TO C. D.
ad te veni, per te me inveni
CONTENTS
Prologue: Changing Course
PART I: Catch
CHAPTER 1
CHAPTER 2
CHAPTER 3
CHAPTER 4
CHAPTER 5
PART II: Drive
CHAPTER 6
CHAPTER 7
CHAPTER 8
CHAPTER 9
CHAPTER 10
CHAPTER 11
CHAPTER 12
CHAPTER 13
CHAPTER 14
CHAPTER 15
PART III: Release
CHAPTER 16
PART IV: Recovery
CHAPTER 17
CHAPTER 18
CHAPTER 19
CHAPTER 20
Epilogue
Acknowledgments
Bibliographic Essay
Prologue
Changing Course
A well-rowed shell is art in motion. It moves smoothly. Stroke after stroke, oars drop in the water and come out together. The rowers’ bodies swing back and forth in sync, performing the same motion of legs, backs, arms at the same instant; no extraneous shrug of the shoulders, flick of the wrist, turn of the head, shift of the seat. The result—perfectly spaced swirls of water trailing the shell’s wake—offers the only visual cue of the speed these on-water dancers live to create.
It’s a deceptively pretty picture, because an all-hands-on-deck battle rages deep within the head of every rower. Forget the wind and the weather; ignore the crew in the lane next door; the real fight pits your single-minded desire against the trio of your physical limitations, your intellect, and your fear.
During a race, the question always boils down to this: How badly do you want to go fast? How much pressure can your body tolerate as the pain crescendos past uncomfortable to excruciating? How completely can you ignore your rational self, which chooses this moment to conduct an in-depth analysis of the importance of rowing and the imperative of speed? How much fear can you stand when its loud voice shrieks of losing and losers, reminding you how hopeless your dreams are and empty your future?
Depends how desperate you are. Because you love this stupid sport.
When it came to rowing, I was a sucker from the start. The heart wants what the heart wants.
The first time I saw a shell in motion, I was sixteen, a high school junior who had slipped the chains of my fancy boarding school life for the briefest of respites. I stood on the Boston shore of the Charles River watching a meandering race, the synchronic back and forth of the rowers’ bodies; the fluid, controlled motion; the play of light on rippling water and polished wood; and I was a goner.
I can easily imagine what I looked like, a landlubber standing by herself. A brown-haired girl with hazel eyes that sidestepped direct contact, dressed in drab thrift-store clothes and a torn, faded blue-jean jacket. My second-hand clothes disguised an upper-middle-class background, and my usual scowl suggested I was just one more defiant, troublemaking adolescent; only a careful observer would see my face already trained in the practice of worry, the sadness in the downward cast of my mouth, and recognize how out to sea I was. Lost and floundering.
Yellow leaves swished through the air as I watched the boats. The river sparkled in the fall light as they rowed by, dark streaks in the star-studded water. The well-varnished wood hulls were nearly submerged, but none of the rowers seemed to notice. A driver hunched in the back of each boat, issuing orders through a small megaphone held by a thin canvas strap wrapped around his ears. He steered with white plastic handles attached to thin wires that disappeared into the boat’s interior and connected to the rudder in some manner both mysterious and invisible to me on shore. Occasionally he rapped the sides of the boat with the handles, as if for emphasis. Eight rowers faced him, sliding back and forth within their allotted spaces, dropping their oars into the tannin-stained water at the same time, pulling to the end of the stroke, and popping them out.
How do they make it so beautiful? I wish I could do that.
Follow the person in front of you, do what they do, hands extend out in front here, legs compress against your chest there, oars arc into the water now, and you can create beauty. Not just beauty, but harmony, too, reliably predictable. You can count on the future, stroke after stroke, as long as you repeat the same set of motions. An endless circle of perfection. Safe and secure in the knowledge of what will come next.
The calm of the scene washed over me, muting my internal drumbeat of anxiety. I had lived with the constant jibber-jabber of my insides, like a hamster scuttling around scenting hidden danger, for long enough not to notice it anymore. I’d have stoutly denied I was uncertain or anxious if you’d asked. But now, desire pierced me with a stabbing suddenness. I didn’t think about who I was: an asthmatic, uncoordinated city girl with the briefest of sports résumés, on the run from my family story. I wanted in to the world flowing by me: peaceful, controlled, synchronized. Give me a big helping of order and routine, splashed with sunlight dancing on water and everyone pulling together.
A careful observer might have noticed the slow ignition of a new passion as I stood in the autumn sunshine, staring at the oars flicking the water. No jumping up and down, no diving into the water and swimming out to claim a seat; just the creep of anticipation across my face as I turned to the sunrise of a new possibility.
In my delight, I missed the pain etched on the rowers’ faces, and overlooked their labored huffing and puffing. Maybe they were too far away. Or maybe the sunlight shimmering on the water obscured the full picture. Perhaps the constant yelling of the coxswains distracted me: Power ten … hard on starboard … give way … ten for concentration … we’re moving, gimme their two seat … we’re open water up. The phrases lifted off the water like fog, a foreign language crafted from familiar words. I may not have understood what I heard, but I was mesmerized by the beauty in motion.
It didn’t take long for me to discover the hidden story of that beauty, even though I never thought I’d have a chance to step into a shell, no matter how smitten I was that day. It was 1974. Title IX was barely two years old; the federal legislation mandating equal access hadn’t yet forced open the gates to sports complexes of all sorts to girls and women, commonly viewed as the gentler sex, a euphemism for fragile and weak. Although I didn’t see myself that way, I saw only guys on the river dancing in the sunshine. I didn’t know rowing could be for girls, too. Besides, I had dreamed of escaping my family for years and nothing ever happened to set me free. I had no reason to think the dream of rowing would end any differently. I didn’t know yet that dreams precede reality, a precursor to creating something from nothing.
Six months after that afternoon by the river, I tore open my college acceptance letter from Yale. Weeks later, I mentioned my interest in rowing to my father; maybe I could try it in college. He responded with an offer to buy me a pair of rowing shoes for my upcoming birthday. Neither of us knew that rowers come barefoot to their shells, sliding their feet into shoes bolted into place, a standard feature. We knew so little about what lay before me.
Rowing’s truths were out by the end of my freshman year at Yale. By then I had stumbled into its demanding embrace, succumbed to its brutal glamour, and accepted its preeminence in my life. I was
in a full-blown love affair with the sport. I wanted it all. I would do whatever it took to be great.
It took me a long time to understand what propelled my leap into this hard, wet world. Initially lured by unfamiliar beauty, I stayed because I found myself in unexpectedly familiar waters: like the world I came from, this one trumpeted the picturesque, easy on the eyes, but hid the pain, hard on the heart.
I grew up among experts in deception who lived one way behind closed doors and another in open spaces. I knew how to buck up and shut up. I knew all about swallowing hard and putting on my game face. I knew how to swim the oceanic emptiness between private terror and public confidence.
Ornery, brash, successful at keeping the world at bay, yet I felt helpless to defend against the endless internal incursions that undermined my poise. I set myself on course to learn how to be tough, how to protect myself. Best defense: strong offense—that was my life, until rowing launched me on my journey of eventual discovery. Rowing taught me toughness, but it turns out I had much more to learn to row my own race.
Looking back, I see the sirens calling from those flimsy boats. I see why I dedicated ten years to going fast.
It wasn’t about winning or Olympic gold. It was about survival.
Of course, at the time I thought it was all about rowing. And really, for a long, long time, it was.
PART I
Catch
1
I endured my first three days of college surrounded by budding Nobel Prize winners, already-published authors, and nonchalant geniuses speaking multiple languages in the course of a single conversation. I crept into my bunk bed for three nights straight, plagued by panic and vivid dreams of walking naked on campus. I woke every morning to a crowd of thoughts clamoring to present more evidence of my mistake. Too young. Not smart enough. Unprepared. Not Ivy League material. Whatever delusion of adequacy my admission to my father’s alma mater had encouraged evaporated like morning dew, and I was left to panic before the stark, unblinking truth: I was an interloper.
I was trudging across Yale’s Old Campus to the Branford Dining Hall for lunch on my fourth day when I saw a long wooden object inside the High Street gate. The shape looked vaguely familiar, although it seemed out of place. I walked up to take a closer look. Several metal triangles poked out from its middle. Its smooth, rounded bottom rested in a pair of scruffy canvas slings. Another fish out of water.
A rowing shell.
For the first time since I arrived on campus, my chattering anxiety quieted. I reached out and touched the varnished wood, ran my hand along the grain and felt its glistening smoothness. I closed my eyes. I could hear the splash of oars and imagine flecks of water cooling my skin as the boat rocked me gently.
A tall man with a faded John Deere baseball cap perched high on his head was handing out fliers and cheerfully calling out to passersby, “Hi there, you want to learn to row?” He had a long regal nose, proportionately prominent, matched by broad fleshy lips. His clean-shaven face was tanned to a burnished red, proof of time served in the weather. His blue jeans sat loosely on his hips and his long-sleeved, fraying denim work shirt was stained with oily grease. He talked only to girls, and only some. He spoke warmly and respectfully, inviting without pushing. He seemed to go for the taller ones and avoided the heavier-set girls. Most people stopped and listened politely, took the flyer he offered, and walked on.
I introduced myself and smiled. “Hi, I want to learn to row.”
His warmth evaporated; his forehead creased as he tugged his baseball cap down to hood his eyes. His sudden, sullen retreat surprised me.
“Uh, you do?” he replied.
Hearing his reticence—not exactly the first no-confidence vote I’d ever heard—I felt something inside lock me into place, defiance clicking into determination. The universe had finally nudged my way and I was not going to squander this chance. I remembered sunlight dancing on water, the rush of calm that surrounded me as I watched those boats glide up the Charles River, like a soft embrace that I could lean into without falling. Nor did I forget the smoothness of the strokes and the orderly repetition of the rowing motion. Again I felt the stirring of an alien feeling: was this hope?
I said, “Yeah, I do want to row. So how do I start?”
He took his cap off and ran his hand through his thinning hair, then plopped the hat back on his head and adjusted the brim downward again. “Um, let’s see …,” he said.
Nat Case, the varsity women’s crew coach, behaved entirely in character that first meeting. At 5′7″, I was a runt as a rower. Nat ascribed to the belief that mass moved boats: in choosing recruits, he sought out the advantage that height conveyed. I would discover he prized it above other, less obvious but more valuable traits.
I pried out of him that learn-to-row sessions had already started in the gym and would continue every afternoon for the rest of the week. I gave him my name and made sure he wrote it on the schedule for the following day. I held out my hand for a flyer until he gave me one.
“Thanks,” I said. “I’ll see you tomorrow.” My voice, perhaps, but the universe had spoken.
Of course I didn’t go to my first rowing lesson alone: fear and anxiety held my hands, tugging me to slow down and rethink matters. Remind me why you think you can do this? Since when are you a jock? But eagerness and excitement had hold of me, too, and they were flying. Nothing could bring me down. I felt like skipping as I walked.
Payne Whitney Gymnasium towered thirteen stories at the edge of campus. Its Gothic design mimicked the majesty of a cathedral; this building meant business. As I stepped into its cavernous entry for the first time, I had no idea what my future held. I would attend more practices in this building, and hear myself utter more pleas for mercy within its walls, than the most devout religious convert would attend services or pray for deliverance.
I found my way down to the dank basement, home of the rowing tanks. There were three, each identified with a spare, utilitarian designation, A, B, and C, side by side in separate four-story-high rooms that resembled airplane hangars. I found my way to the one assigned to the girls, in the basement’s west corner. Dingy yellow brick covered the walls. Half windows, cut high into the back walls, allowed in slits of natural light. Plain light fixtures with bare bulbs hung from the ceilings. The machinery propelling the water in the tanks hummed. I had entered a factory, noisy and purposeful, whose workers focused on maximal productivity, efficient use of resources, consistent effort: a blue-collar haven in the bowels of an Ivy League world.
Tank C looked like a giant bathtub sunk about four feet into the gym floor, with a narrow island bisecting its entire length. The bottom was painted a graying white, with cheery pale blue walls: gazing into the tub was like looking at a watery reflection of a cloudy tableau, with blue sky horning in at the edges of dour weather. Safety railings surrounding the tank had mirrors attached to their insides to allow rowers to check and correct their technique.
Eight stations were dug into the tank’s island, one behind another, each with its own equipment. A small wooden backless seat with wheels slid back and forth on a pair of narrow metal tracks. Directly in front lay the foot-stretcher, a simple mechanism comprising a heel cup at the bottom and an adjustable leather flap on top that accommodated all foot sizes, angled at forty-five degrees.
Oarlocks were bolted on strips of wood that ran the full length of the island along both edges. They looked ancient: rusty metal holders with gates that locked into place to prevent oars from bouncing out during a stroke. Each station had one oar, alternating port and starboard sides. The wooden oars had thick handles, smoothed by many hands, blotched with blood and stained by sweat, and collars attached at the same place along the shaft of every oar. When the oars were extended through the oarlocks to row, the collars rested against the locks, preventing the oars from sliding too far into the water. The oars’ narrow blades were painted in two horizontal stripes: Yale blue on the water edge, pristine white across the top.
A few girls lounged against the railing, observing the rowers in the tank. I wondered who they were. Perhaps more newbies like me? They were talking and smiling among themselves, whereas I knew no one. Several other girls were rowing in the tank, following the person in front of them. Their movements looked a tiny bit like the rowing I remembered from the Charles River. I watched them for a moment and then spied the coach I’d spoken with the day before. He was holding a clipboard, had a pencil tucked behind his ear, wedged under his baseball cap, and had hiked up one of his long legs against the outer wall of the tank. He leaned against his bent knee as he closely watched the rowers.
“Hi, I’m here to learn to row.”
He glanced my way, responding gruffly, “Hmmm, hi. What’s your name?” I told him and he scanned his list. He didn’t find it; this seemed impossible, as I’d watched him write it down. But no matter. I stood and waited until he added my name to the sheet.
“This group is just finishing up. You can join the next session.”
My turn finally came to step in. I walked up the short flight of steps and down to the strip of seats. I wanted to shriek and do a victory dance, but everyone else was just choosing a place and sitting down, so I said nothing. Heart pounding, thoughts buzzing, ready to dive in, I sat in the first available seat, behind three other people, and did what they did. How am I going to hold onto my oar with such sweaty hands?