SE: K-State Rowing’s ‘Family Day’ Enhances Team’s Family Feel
Nov 18, 2019 | Rowing, Sports Extra
By Corbin McGuire
Oars clashed, water splashed, and a family grew closer on Sunday morning.
It was the K-State rowing team's second annual Family Day, where more than 100 parents and siblings stepped into the life of a rower. The team — commonly referred to, internally, as "Row Fam" — tightened that circle by educating their families on the sport that many of them travel across the country to watch compete.
"I think we do it because the parents get to see us from the shoreline and they get to see the boats from far away and they get to hear about it from us on the phone, but they don't really get to actually see it in person," junior Taylor Hartman said of the event. "So, it gives them a chance to experience it and get a taste of what we do."
That taste started with a trip out to the Breidenthal Boathouse, the team's home on Tuttle Creek Reservoir.
There, K-State's rowers gave their families an up-close look at their boats. Coxswains, specifically, took the families through starts, the speaker system they run to communicate with their boat and the technology they use to gauge how their boat is doing during a race or practice.
"This is just a chance for us to show our parents what we do. They, often times, don't get to see the scenes in the background, like what we do to just take eight minutes on the water to race," Emily Johnson, a senior coxswain, said. "This gives them a chance to get in our shoes a little bit, to see all the equipment that we use, to understand the sport a little bit more, so they can maybe watch it with a little more in-depth knowledge."
The crash course, quite literally, continued at the at the K-State Intercollegiate Rowing Center.
Parents learned the basics of using the Erg machines, as well as how to work on the team's indoor tank. The latter, at times, was as comical as it was eye-opening to the complexities of the sport.
"The most rewarding, to me, is the amount of support that showed up and the looks on everyone's faces, seeing how complex it is but how simple it is in the same respect, because the tank is very (simplified) but everybody was in there crashing and bashing," laughed senior Mattie Warner, who came up with the idea for the event last year and helped organize it again this year. "So, just seeing us in them is kind of fun."
Later, after parents and siblings struggled in the tank, a group of K-State rowers stepped in and showed them what it was supposed to look like. James Jensen, father to sophomore Madison Jensen, said this was the moment that stood out to him from the day.
"The biggest highlight was seeing the ladies in the tank over here. We were just splashing around and hitting the walls, clanking and clacking, and they were just so peaceful. It just sounded like waves," he said. "Seeing the ladies in there rowing, that was the coolest thing. When you're on the shore, you see them row by for about five, 10 seconds, but here you got to feel it and hear it."
Warner, Hartman and Johnson all led a question-and-answer session as well.
Parents asked about the team's hardest workouts, to which the answers varied from the stairs in Bramlage Coliseum to "10-9-8-7s," where rowers Erg at a certain pace for those respective minutes.
The rowers also explained different sport terminology, such as splits, runs, stroke rate and drag factor.
They broke down race strategy and how that is developed. They spoke on the level of commitment to one another that's needed to succeed in the sport. They shared why the family feeling within the team is crucial, and how events like Sunday's help broaden and strengthen that support.
"The rowing family is super important. We have always had an outstanding number of parents and family and friends show up at our competitions. Even when we're over in Tennessee, even when we're out in California, we've always had a large group of family there for us," Johnson said. "It's just super special because we've all really never done this sport before. So, to have that support come from our parents and our family in something we've never tried before is super fun.
"Seeing all the parents engaged with their athlete and try to figure out and understand and ask so many questions about our sport was super awesome. Obviously, the parents don't know what the sport is about, and we barely knew what the sport was about when we first started, so I'm sure it's very rewarding for the parents for the come in and actually understand what's going on."
Oars clashed, water splashed, and a family grew closer on Sunday morning.
It was the K-State rowing team's second annual Family Day, where more than 100 parents and siblings stepped into the life of a rower. The team — commonly referred to, internally, as "Row Fam" — tightened that circle by educating their families on the sport that many of them travel across the country to watch compete.
"I think we do it because the parents get to see us from the shoreline and they get to see the boats from far away and they get to hear about it from us on the phone, but they don't really get to actually see it in person," junior Taylor Hartman said of the event. "So, it gives them a chance to experience it and get a taste of what we do."
That taste started with a trip out to the Breidenthal Boathouse, the team's home on Tuttle Creek Reservoir.
There, K-State's rowers gave their families an up-close look at their boats. Coxswains, specifically, took the families through starts, the speaker system they run to communicate with their boat and the technology they use to gauge how their boat is doing during a race or practice.
"This is just a chance for us to show our parents what we do. They, often times, don't get to see the scenes in the background, like what we do to just take eight minutes on the water to race," Emily Johnson, a senior coxswain, said. "This gives them a chance to get in our shoes a little bit, to see all the equipment that we use, to understand the sport a little bit more, so they can maybe watch it with a little more in-depth knowledge."
The crash course, quite literally, continued at the at the K-State Intercollegiate Rowing Center.
Parents learned the basics of using the Erg machines, as well as how to work on the team's indoor tank. The latter, at times, was as comical as it was eye-opening to the complexities of the sport.
"The most rewarding, to me, is the amount of support that showed up and the looks on everyone's faces, seeing how complex it is but how simple it is in the same respect, because the tank is very (simplified) but everybody was in there crashing and bashing," laughed senior Mattie Warner, who came up with the idea for the event last year and helped organize it again this year. "So, just seeing us in them is kind of fun."
Later, after parents and siblings struggled in the tank, a group of K-State rowers stepped in and showed them what it was supposed to look like. James Jensen, father to sophomore Madison Jensen, said this was the moment that stood out to him from the day.
"The biggest highlight was seeing the ladies in the tank over here. We were just splashing around and hitting the walls, clanking and clacking, and they were just so peaceful. It just sounded like waves," he said. "Seeing the ladies in there rowing, that was the coolest thing. When you're on the shore, you see them row by for about five, 10 seconds, but here you got to feel it and hear it."
Warner, Hartman and Johnson all led a question-and-answer session as well.
Parents asked about the team's hardest workouts, to which the answers varied from the stairs in Bramlage Coliseum to "10-9-8-7s," where rowers Erg at a certain pace for those respective minutes.
The rowers also explained different sport terminology, such as splits, runs, stroke rate and drag factor.
They broke down race strategy and how that is developed. They spoke on the level of commitment to one another that's needed to succeed in the sport. They shared why the family feeling within the team is crucial, and how events like Sunday's help broaden and strengthen that support.
"The rowing family is super important. We have always had an outstanding number of parents and family and friends show up at our competitions. Even when we're over in Tennessee, even when we're out in California, we've always had a large group of family there for us," Johnson said. "It's just super special because we've all really never done this sport before. So, to have that support come from our parents and our family in something we've never tried before is super fun.
"Seeing all the parents engaged with their athlete and try to figure out and understand and ask so many questions about our sport was super awesome. Obviously, the parents don't know what the sport is about, and we barely knew what the sport was about when we first started, so I'm sure it's very rewarding for the parents for the come in and actually understand what's going on."
Players Mentioned
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