This event was not only a great success for Haddon Township as Regatta hosts, but it was a great success for our athletes. In fact it was the single best team performance I have witnessed in my year and a half as a coach for the club. Of the 28 Haddon Township competitors that participated in this event 26 of them posted a new personal record. New novice woman, Sara Rosenberg posted an 8:34.4 to take home the most-improved award on the team. She beat her previous score by a whopping 23.9 seconds. She is joined by varsity teammate, Erik Monzo who improved his previous best time by 23. 6 seconds. Novices Cassidy Leyendecker and Sam Lieb-Randall also posted new personal best scores that are 20 seconds or better faster than their previous score. Novices Jim Hawley and Evan Taylor shortened their scores by 15 seconds or more and Varsity athletes: Greg Cuneo, Quinn Fitzpatrick, Ryan Rousseau, Julie Cippon, Jillian Krieger, Emily Davis, and Caley O'Brien also all finished 5 seconds or faster over their previous personal best.
Not only did our athletes perform well individually, but they raced smarter and tougher than I have ever seen them race. Haddon Township athletes were routinely in the bottom 1/3 of the standings in the 1st 500-m of the race only to coolly and calmly climb back into the top 2-5-or 10 spots of their event or heat. As a team, we came into the regatta with a plan and executed our goals, almost to the member. Many of our athletes such as Catie Ely and Mandy Fry vaulted high into the standings after sensible starts to win or place in their heat. In fact 13 of our 28 athletes finished in the top 10 in their event and 7 of those 13 finished in the top 5. 2 of our athletes were able to take home medals, Senior Greg Cuneo, who rowed to a 5.1 second improvement over his previous best, placed 2nd in his lightweight men's event, and Freshman Emily Donovan raced an outstanding race to finish 2nd overall (of 33) in the Women's HS Novice event. Sophomore Julie Cippon and Catie Ely finished 4th and 5th in their events, Senior Emily Davis became the first female at Haddon Township to break 7:50, crossing the line in 7:46.0, a 5.3 second improvement over her previous best and good enough to place 5th in the women's open event and Quinn Fitzpatrick rushed across the finish line in 6th place.
I truly can't remember a time when I was more proud of our athletes. To the person, every member of the team fought tooth and nail for the score they achieved and there is not a single score that I am disappointed with today. Even those few athletes that didn't quite have their top performance showed up and raced hard and fought with a new resolve that has not been evident on this team in the past and the results where exciting. I hope all of the members of the team have a new confidence going into this spring season and are excited to get back to racing on the water. One thing that we truly lacked last year, was the ability to stay calm in stressful situations, causing blow ups and initiating illogical racing strategies. Today, it was an inspiring site to watch Sophomores Catie Ely, Julie Cippon, and Jillian Krieger create a great racing strategy on their own and follow it to the letter with unprecedented results; to walk down the line of pained and panicked faces in the women's HS open event only to find Senior Emily Davis, and Junior Tori King calmly pushing their way up the standings, to watch Senior Greg Cuneo work his way into second place early in the race after a disappointing race two weeks ago and finally, to see things start to go wrong for Emily Gartland with 600-m to go but to watch her really gut it out to get across the line under 8 minutes. These are things we simply were unable to do as a team last year. I hope it is evident to all of the athletes, the value of their hard work and determination this winter.
Though we still have a lot of legos to place and a much bigger house to build this spring and next year, I am very happy with the team's performance today and thus far this winter. I am confidant, if the athletes attack training on the water like they have attacked this winter training season that we will find a new success this spring.
Individuals can view results from all of our physio testing here: https://spreadsheets.google.com/ccc?key=0Ah1X1Npp3WkmcDM3MW5XQ19JOWNubldWbGM3bjBQR2c&hl=en
