While 5 a.m. is not a time when most people are making choices, for me this early hour has become make-or-break. Instead of rolling over and hitting the snooze button on my alarm clock, I stare at the flashing neon lights and decide it’s time to get up — I am a rower.
I don’t know how much you know about rowing, but I’m going to assume that although you are a student at the University of Toronto, it’s not going to be a whole lot. Maybe you stopped with sports after high school, or maybe they just weren’t your thing to begin with.
Either way, you’re in the majority, and until I joined rowing so was I.
When I first joined our team, it was nothing more than a small rag-tag bunch who’d meet up at 5:30 a.m. down by Cherry Beach. Although we’ve progressed since then, our equipment is still old, our boat houses are still rusty, and our lake is still beautiful.
We row from the shelter of the Leslie Street Spit. Our course runs out past Centre Island or around into Toronto’s Inner Harbor.
At morning training, it’s usually the dawn that seems to find us. We’re too intent on beating our teammates to notice something as commonplace as the sunrise, even if it turns the skyline into an urban picture postcard.
Rowing is tough. It involves long hours, hard workouts, and an endless quest for perfection. There’s a thin layer of carbon fiber between you and the lake, and you’re essentially stranded in a floating shell with your crew. Blisters are the norm, and it’s always cold and wet, if not just plain miserable.
But the desire to succeed is what drives us to chase down our friends, break ourselves, and sit steaming in t-shirts on the lake come the end of October.
U of T is a big school and it’s easy to get lost. But down at the club, or on the rowing machines over the winter, you get to know your teammates, and you realize that you share a common goal that you strive towards together —that makes all the difference in the world.
Then there are my teammates who’ve also looked groggily at their alarm and decided to get out of bed, the people who will go to the gym with me throughout the winter, the people who I party with, and the people who I go to breakfast with. My teammates are my best friends — the people that I really know and trust.
As a rower, you are the one who decides to commit, but it’s for the people who you go though the hell of morning training with, the people with whom you fight though the pain of working out and racing with.
These are the people who you end up calling to help you move your stuff at the last minute, road trip with, or who look after you when you’ve been kicked out of the Brunny for vomiting on the bar.
Rowing isn’t just about winning, it’s about being part of a team. It’s about working together for our school, for our crew, and for ourselves. It’s about never being satisfied and never settling.
