Rowing Together: 2015 RowingRelated Year in Review


We've had a lot of fun at RowingRelated in 2015—our biggest year yet. And we couldn't have done it without you. Here's what we mean by that.

Design
In 2015, we put a lot of thought into design and site navigation. We know it's not the most complex website in the world, but streamlining site navigation and making our five years (!) of content readily accessible and easy to discover for you was one of our top priorities. And, we gave our logo a new look.

RR logo, 2012-2015
 
Content
We launched the first season of our Best Rowing Drills series (stay tuned for a second season coming up soon), featuring some of the most important and influential coaches and athletes in our sport. Thanks very much again to Kevin Sauer of Virginia women's rowing for being the guinea pig and getting things started right! And, in the midst of it all, Conlin McCabe—card carrying member of the sub-5:40 club—shared his knowledge about how to approach your 2k.

We connected with the Virginia men's rowing team for the second time, as they prepared to head across the pond and race at the 2015 Henley Royal Regatta, and offered an inside view of their experience thanks to Forrest Brown in our #HoosGoingToHenley series.


Another new addition, building on an RR tradition, was the creation of our Rankings page—we've long posted rankings articles, but in 2015 we added a current rankings system and ranked our top 10 NCAA and IRA teams, and top 5 ACRA and junior rowing teams, updating them throughout the spring racing season. We also added archives to the Rankings page, making it easy to look up historical rankings while keeping the current rankings cleaner and easier to read.

Recently, we added another wrinkle to this, with our Records page—the goal there being to collect all the known world records, on land (for 6k, 5k, and 2k) and on the water (for each boat and weight class), for junior, U23, and senior level athletes.

Finally, we broke what was arguably the biggest story in U.S. collegiate rowing in years—Bob Ernst's departure from Washington—and were credited with breaking the news by The Seattle Times. Since that time, many people have expressed their opinions on the situation, but if you ask us, the go-to piece on Ernst and the Huskies was written by UW alum Megan Kalmoe. 

Social
Here's where we want to give you a big shout-out: Our social following has grown tremendously over the past 12 months, and (obviously) we couldn't have done it without you. Thank you all for sharing, liking, reposting, and helping us to grow. As a result, we blew through the 2million page view mark, and have seen our Facebook and Twitter audiences roughly double.



And, leading the way this year has been our Instagram account, which has grown by roughly 17,000 since last December to 18,600 plus at time of writing, with more than 650,000 likes to our posts over that time. It has been a joy connecting with people from all over the world, from India, to South Africa, Germany, Australia, New Zealand, the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, Brazil, Argentina, as well as here in our home country, the United States.

In short, you're the best.

Outlook
2016 is an Olympic year, and, just like everyone else in the rowing community, we're looking to step up our game. Together, through thoughtful discussion, highlighting the best performances, and celebrating the achievements of the leaders in our sport, we can help change and grow the culture of rowing, in the U.S. and beyond.

-RR

Trending posts this month

"I Row Crew" — Rowing in 'The Social Network'

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Like many of the rowing faithful, I've been keeping up with the saga penned by Dan Boyne about the filming of the rowing scenes in David Fincher and Aaron Sorkin's The Social Network , and I must say I had high hopes going into the film. The first problem I encountered: the phrase, "I row crew." It was uttered so many times before anyone "rowed crew" on the water that I had trouble buying any of it later. It's understandable that the character of Mark Zuckerberg makes that mistake, since he has no idea about the sport. But when the Winklevoss twins themselves utter the phrase several times, one begins to wonder where Boyne was when these lines were not being chopped or changed. Seriously, who says that? As far as the actual rowing goes, the first scene, which has the twins out training in a pair along with the rest of the Harvard squad, is not all bad — it just ends that way. The line, "Those guys are freakin' fast" is certainly every b...
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The 30 Best Rowing Coaches of All Time, Part 3: The Top 10

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The top 10 best rowing coaches, including guess who (Photo © Iain Weir / Rowing Photography ) It's time for the third and final part of our 3-part series on the best of the best in the rowing coaching ranks. These coaches not only command respect based on performance, but have also shown the ability to adapt to new circumstances, build dynasties, and ultimately help shape the trajectory of rowing as a sport. Honestly, it would be easy to extend this series into 10 more posts... But we wouldn't do that to you. As we've said before, the hope is that the following may serve to educate and spark discussion, as both an appreciation of history and of the coaching craft. Also note: As we stated in Part 1 and Part 2 of this series, there are few women in this list, but that is a reflection of a general underrepresentation of women in the head coaching ranks in our sport—and indeed (as has been well documented ) a growing number of NCAA sports in the United States. ...
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Winter Workouts: Why Do Rowers Fear the Erg?

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Op-Ed from the RowingRelated Editorial Staff Friend. Not foe. (Illustration: B. Kitch) I am really frustrated by our sport when it comes to the erg being viewed as a torture device rather than a helpful tool that people can enjoy. This negative mindset, which is extremely contagious, plagues the sport, preventing athletes from training to their potential and possibly serving as one of the reasons that careers in rowing, at every level, are often so short. When compared to other endurance sports, I have not encountered an equal level of disdain for such fundamental mental and physical endurance training. My main problem is that everywhere I turn in the rowing community, whether it's high school rowers, college athletes, or even national team hopefuls, I hear of people dreading the erg. I've never heard about a cross country runner 'dreading' a track workout. True, basketball and football players may dread running wind sprints or other such conditioning acti...
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So, are Naked Rowing Calendars a Thing Now?

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Warwick rowers are all in again this year (Photo courtesy of Warwick Boat Club)  The phenomenon started four years ago with the Warwick Rowing men's squad. Then, the following year, the Warwick women's team joined the fray. Now, Newcastle University's men and women are back on the naked calendar train. So, the question is, have rowing and naked calendars become a thing? The above video features the 2014-2015 Warwick women's squad—the third edition of the calendar , and, from the looks of it, the raciest. However, perhaps not so racy as that of the 2014-2015 Warwick men (see below). But raciness aside, all four of these teams have chosen worthy charities and have gone "the full monty" to make sure that those causes have received considerable contributions. The Warwick women contribute to Macmillan Cancer Support —a cause for which Warwick reports it has donated some £5,000. The Warwick men? Sport Allies —a charity that combats homophobia in spor...
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Will It Make the Boat Go Faster? At Marin Rowing Association, Culture is Key

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Hands in after training  My alarm goes off—it’s 4:22am.  It’s been a while since I did this. Immediately, I think back to a college dorm room, rolling out of bed and running down the steps to carpool caravan to Marina Del Rey.  Not this time, though. It’s a Tuesday in late September, and I’m heading across the Golden Gate Bridge to Greenbrae, California, where I’ll meet with the Marin Rowing Men’s Masters squad. Fortunately, it’s an unusually warm morning—and when I roll in, the boathouse is already buzzing with activity.  Launch time: 5:10. Heading out into the Bay before dawn The Marin Rowing Association program has both men’s and women’s masters boats competing to win at every event they attend. In the fall, that can only mean one thing: The Head Of The Charles .  The boat that Coach Rodrigo Rodrigues and I spend most of our time with is the Grand Masters eight—average age 60+. But that’s just one of five crews that launched with us that morning. Everyone’s ...
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