Just up the street from the Orange line T stop at Roxbury Crossing is the Reggie Lewis Track and Field Center in Boston, Massachusetts. On any ordinary day of the week, this cavernous building is rather empty, with perhaps a few dozen runners circling the rubber track. In other words, it's nothing too special.
But this past Sunday was different, as hundreds of rowers converged on the Reggie Lewis Track and Field Center to compete in the 1997 C.R.A.S.H.-B. Sprints World Indoor Rowing Championships -- thus transforming this center of solitude into a palace of pain.
You think some of Dartmouth's hard-core oarsmen would miss this chance to flex a little muscle and shed a little sweat? God no. Not for the world.
"On Saturday, we just kind of piled into cars and headed down to Boston in classic roadtrip style," said heavyweight rower James Jarrett '97.
So off they went, cruising down I89 to I93, about a dozen of them, all suited up in sweatgear with gallons of Gatorade and piles of Powerbars stashed away in their gym bags.
"CRASH-B's is a crazy event -- hundreds of people in one place to experience six to eight minutes of pain," said varsity rower Tracy Tylee '98. "One hundred people all erging at once is enough to get anyone's adrenaline going. It was great."
"The competition started at nine o'clock in the morning and by ten-thirty, there was a serious oxygen debt in the building," Jarrett said. "There were paramedics all over the place and people were fainting and passing out left and right."
Yup, the gymnasium was definitely turning into a torture chamber -- a chamber that housed some world-class athletes and some pretty psycho characters to boot.
"The scene was probably similar to what most rowers would conceive hell to be like -- rows of ergometers lined up ready to inflict pain," explained varsity coxswain Alton Lo '99.
But on the whole, it was a worthwhile experience for everyone.
"The event was definitely an eye-opener," said freshman heavyweight Kermit Cook. "As a freshman who has never rowed before, it was great to have a chance to compete head-to-head with some people and to have a race in the middle of the long months of winter training."
"The guy who erged next to me was the Concept II rower brought in from Finland," Cook said. "He absolutely destroyed me. The guy just keeps paddling, barely breathing hard, and says 'it was easy' in a thick accent. It was great -- like something out of Terminator II."
Some of Dartmouth's rookies had trouble adjusting to the high-pressure situation.
"I went in the seventh heat and it was a little nerve-wracking to see all the other competitors before me in pain and knowing that I'd be in that same position soon," Heather Wakeley '00 said.
When it was finally Heather's turn to strut her stuff and pull like she's never pulled before, she went into a state which rowers commonly call "the zone."
"I pretty much closed everything else out, like the rowers next to me," she said. "I didn't want to see how they were doing because I knew I was going to do my best, period."
Wakeley's strategy paid off in the end as she finished third in the Junior Women's division behind two European competitors -- thus making her the nation's top 18-and-under female rower.
Tylee used a similar approach to the competition. "[Erging] is a terribly painful experience," she said. "So you just can't think about it, or there's no way you are going to be able to do it. I usually just completely zone out when I'm erging."
Tylee's performance was good enough to boost her into the finals, where finished 17th overall in the Open Women's division.
Then there's the story of the other hotshot heavyweight freshman, Almin Hodzic, who overcame injury to pull a personal best at the event.
"I wasn't supposed to compete since I had an injury which was kind of serious so I just went down with the guys just to see what it was like," Hodzic said.
"It was an amazing scene, so many ergs at one place and also some kick ass rowers," Hodzic added. "That gave me an inspiration so I decided to do it, even though I knew it was going to hurt."
So what's the deal with these rower folks? Are they all insane? Do they have nothing better to do with their weekends? Do they have an inner lust for physical pain? Perhaps they're all of the above.
"We are definitely going to be a strong crew this year," Cook said. "Everyone has really killed themselves over the winter and we've gotten much stronger."
Yeah, that's what it's all about -- Dartmouth's rowers going to great lengths to "kill themselves" for the sake of putting together some fast crews.
