Row Big RedYou have to get up early to catch up with Nebraska's collegiate rowers. Story and Photography by Mike Whye |
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"Nebraska has a rowing team!"
That’s what members of the Nebraska
Crew often hear from others, including their parents and other relatives, when
they say they’re on the rowing team at the university’s Lincoln
campus.
“And I’ve heard, ‘Why
would you row?’ and, “Why would you even do that?’”
said Lindsey Oltjenbruns, a senior who is president of the “crew,”
as the rowing team is known. Admittedly, rowing as a sport at UNL seems as out
of place as cranberries growing amid Nebraska cornfields.
Despite that, members of the crew
have been representing the university in competitions from Texas to Massachusetts
since the men’s rowing team was formed in 1969; the women’s crew
started three years later. Last fall, the 40 men and women traveled to five
Midwestern regattas, winning medals in three.
Like any sport, winning medals comes
at a cost. Three times a week during the fall and spring seasons, members of
the crew meet at their boathouse on campus at 5 a.m. From there, they drive
25 miles in darkness to Branched Oak Lake State Recreation Area, where their
boats (called shells), oars and other gear are stored on property leased by
the Lincoln West Optimist Club.
With flashlights hardly penetrating
the dark, crew members make their way to where the shells rest upside down on
racks. Water in the rain-soaked ground squishes into everyone’s shoes,
producing grunts and sharp words.