Berkeley High Crew Team
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Berkeley High Crew Team
Website for BHS Crew: berkeleyhighcrew.org
Jan 2009
My 8th grader son will attend BHS in fall and would like to try crew. I'm
wondering if any of you with sons can inform me about being a freshman at BHS
and doing crew. Are there crew camps you recommend to get him started (he's
never tried it)? I saw Oakland Oars on the internet, are there more, is that a
good one? Any info would be helpful.
I am the parent of two boys that have become rowers through
the Berkeley High Crew program. My oldest found out about
BHS Crew at the BHS Freshman orientation night when he
stopped by the crew info table and picked up a
brochure. He ended up rowing all four years on the men's
crew team, and was recruited to row at Cornell, where he is
now a freshman oarsman. His younger brother is now in his
third year of rowing as a BHS junior. Most kids have
no experience as rowers before high school, so almost all
start as novices and get in a rowing shell for the first
time as Freshmen. In addition to getting your child in great
shape and building self confidence and focus,
one of best things about BHS crew is that it gives Freshmen
an instant group of friends, helping to ease their
transition into huge BHS. Conditioning practice begins in
October at BHS leading up to the spring racing season.
The BHS crew boathouse is at Jack London Aquatic Center at
JL Square, which we share with the Oakland Strokes club.
Strokes has a summer rowing camp, but there is also a summer
rowing camp on Lake Merritt in Oakland run by BHS
head coach Chris Dadd that is an excellent intro to the
sport. Contact Chris at thecrew4bhs@earthlink.net or go to
the BHS crew website at berkeleyhighcrew.org
Tom
September 2005
can anyone give me advice on whether the berkeley high crew
team would be a good activity for an introverted freshman
girl? it seems quite demanding and intense in terms of the
commitment required. how do the students/team members treat
one another? is it a welcoming and affirming environment?
thanks for any input/experiences you can share.
frosh parent
I cannot speak as a parent of an introverted daughter, but I can tell
you that my daughter has been on the team for one year and is
addicted to it. She was never athletic and didn't want to do any
competitive sports. The great thing about crew is that no individual
stands out as the star of the team. But there are still ways that the
rowers can demonstrate gains in their skills. She loves the
physical demands, partly because she wants to stay in shape
(rowers can eat a lot and not gain weight). She loves the
comaraderie (sp?) with the other girls on the team. I won't tell you
that crew is perfect; of course it isn't. But I haven't heard of major
problems with team mates not getting along. I will say that there
was an incident last year when some girls had been drinking
earlier in the day and then came to a practice. They weren't drunk
but word got out about it. This was taken very seriously by the
coaches and parents and dealt with directly; no further problems
have occurred. I would say overall the crew environment is
supportive, responsible and appropriately, not ridiculously,
demanding.
This is in response to the parent of a freshman girl at BHS
who is wondering about whether crew would be a good
experience. I have a son who just graduated BHS and was on
the men's team for 4 years. He had many friends on the
womens' team, so I know a bit about the girls' team,
competitively and socially. The girls are often very
supportive of each other, even though there is competition
between rowers within the team. They've organized and
carried out fundraising together all on their own. Last
year they organized an ongoing study group in support of one
team member whose GPA was going to keep her from competing,
and they all would get together to do homework to help her
focus because they wanted her to be able to compete. They
organize their own pasta feeds the night before a race.
Many of them are social together outside of the actual crew
events and workouts.
The social environment of 14-year-olds is pretty hard to
predict in terms of what it's like from year to year and
from person to person, so there's no guarantee it would be a
good fit for any particular individual. Crew is a big
commitment in terms of time and effort, but it offers huge
physical and social benefits in return, and it can be really
fun too. It was very good for my son. I'd encourage her to
give it a try.
sbrann
My daughter has had a wonderful time doing crew. She
refers to it sometimes as ''a cult'' - meaning particularly
that it is a big commitment. Her experience was that
everyone was extremely friendly, and you get to know the
other novices well. They're an interesting group of
girls. She says she loves the feeling of flying over the
water - that's what keeps her excited about it. The early
mornings are a drag - but she nevertheless gets up for
them, even though she's a natural slugabed. The tiredness
does have an effect on how much schoolwork they can do,
though, and you should all be aware that it will take up
all your free time, leaving little or none for socialising
or tv. (That's my caveat, my daughter doesn't care)
Fiona
I am actively involved with BHS crew and sit on its parent
board. I have two daughters who have been/are on the team
and each has had different experiences, different years due
to their personality, their success in the sport and the
coach that year. Freshman and new rowers train separately
from the returning rowers, so freshman year was really fun
for each of my daughters - or they would not have continued.
But the girls who join are different each year, so your
daughter really needs to find out if she likes the other
girls this year. And my once shy, introverted daughter has
been successful with the team and in the sport although she
isn't best friends with anyone on the team, she loves it,
she was really excited this morning that practices were
starting and she a lot less shy now. Lastly my daughters
spend less time on rowing than I did on classical
music/orchestra when I was in high school, so I have trouble
with the perception that crew is such a big comittment -
other activities that teenagers participate in can be a big
committment, crew is just one and a really great one at that.
Mary
this page was last updated: Feb 9, 2009
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