Rowing as a team sport might bring to mind the summer Olympics or Ivy League crew teams gliding seamlessly along the river in their long, narrow boats.

The sport has become a seasonal fixture a little closer to home, at Lake Wheeler in Raleigh. And local teenagers are finding that spending afternoons out on the water with their teammates is not only a fun way to keep in shape but a great social outlet as well.

“If you watch Olympic rowers it looks like the easiest thing in the world,” said Meredith Gilmer, 17, of Cary. “They’re so in synch, that’s what we want to achieve.”

Gilmer is a Green Hope High School student and member of Wake Rowing, a club for youth rowers ages 13-19.

The club is just finishing the spring season. They practice weekdays after school in spring and fall and travel for several regional competitions.

“We’ve really worked on building the team,” said head coach Nancy Blom, who has been rowing since her college days. After aging out of college crew teams, she has remained active in masters competitions and also as a coach.

Blom said one of the great things about the sport, as she quickly realized in college, is that “late in life you can be a novice and still be competitive.”

On a recent sunny afternoon at Lake Wheeler, a couple of teams took one last practice run before heading to a race in Tennessee.

“That’s it — long and smooth. Dig deep — I don’t care how much it hurts!” Blom said through a megaphone while coaching from a small motor boat. Conditions on Lake Wheeler were better than most days, with relatively little wind.

“There’s a lot of power and technique in that boat,” Blom said. “The men’s four are just amazing. We’re hoping they can make the finals and shine.”

The teens — Wake Rowing is about evenly split between boys and girls — learn quickly that rowing is a “team” sport in every sense.

“You could have four people who are all strong and all have good technique, but not do well if they’re not working together,” said Trevor Cunnien, 16, of Cary.

Added Blom, “It’s a sport where there is no standout athlete. It’s a team effort — balance and timing.”

Blom likens the feeling when a team is in synch to a runner’s high: “It just feels effortless,” she said.

So what does it take to be a good competitor?

The “classic” competitive rower has height, flexibility and perhaps most important, rhythm, Blom said.

But that doesn’t mean short, petite rowers cannot compete, Blom said.

“Look at our lightweight [team] girls. They are petite or tall and thin and do very well.”

The original rowers surely had a bit more bulk. The history of competitive rowing goes back more than 2,000 years, with its first mention in “The Aeneid,” according to fairfaxcrew.com.

During the 1700s the sport became popular on the Thames River in England. The Thames is still home to three high-profile events including the annual race between Oxford and Cambridge universities.

The British can also be credited for some of the sport’s lingo.

“I sweep and scull,” Cunnien said, adding, “I’m really partial to the four and quad.”

Translated: sweepers use one oar; scullers use two. The “four” refers to four rowers with one oar each, plus a coxswain (we’ll get to that in a minute). The “quad” is four rowers, two oars each, and no coxswain.

Coxswain, a British term, is the person who steers the boat and is the on-the-water coach for the crew, according to the U.S. Rowing Association. Blom said the sport has yet to catch on in a big way among youth in this state, with only about 200 rowers in North Carolina.

But once introduced to the sport, some teens find they like the intense physical challenge, the chance to be out on the water and the heavy emphasis on teamwork.

“I used to be a cheerleader, which was very individual. Everything was about your personal best,” Gilmer said. “With rowing, you have to work together, there is not another option. It forces you to form bonds. Me and my lightweight women are very close.”

Cunnien and his varsity four team have been rowing together a few years now.

“A big part of it is we’re all pretty good friends on the team,” Cunnien said. “We’ve known each other a number of years and we all get along pretty well. It helps keep the animosity out of our technique.

“It’s a good social event,” he added.

Wake Rowing, now in its sixth year, has 33 members, several of whom, like Cunnien, are Enloe High School students. The team has traveled to Tennessee and Florida for competitions this spring, and also hosted a competition on Lake Wheeler against other youth teams.

The club falls under the Juniors program of the U.S. Rowing Association, which also oversees the Olympic team, masters program and others.

Gilmer has one more year with Wake Rowing before she heads to college, where she hopes to join a crew team. She said not only will it help her find an instant group of friends, but she’s gotten hooked on the sport.

She said there’s nothing like feeling the “swing” — more lingo — that hard-to-define feeling of perfect synchronization.

“It just feels good when the boat just feels good in the water and everybody just clicks together in the boat, perfectly in synch. I love that feeling.”

Rowing Terms
Coxswain: Person who steers the shell and is the on-the-water coach for the crew.

Ergometer: Rowers call it an “erg.” It’s a rowing machine that closely approximates the actual rowing motion. The rowers’ choice is the Concept II, which utilizes a flywheel and a digital readout so that the rower can measure his “strokes per minute” and the distance covered.

Lightweight: Refers to the rowers, not the boats; there is a maximum weight for each rower in a lightweight event as well as a boat average.

Power 10: A call for rowers to do 10 of their best, most powerful strokes. It’s a strategy used to pull ahead of a competitor. Sculls: One of the two disciplines of rowing — the one where scullers use two oars or sculls.

Sweep: One of the two disciplines of rowing — the one where rowers use only one oar. Pairs (for two people), fours (for four people) and the eight are sweep boats. Pairs and fours may or may not have a coxswain. Eights always have a coxswain.

Swing: The hard-to-define feeling when near-perfect synchronization of motion occurs in the shell, enhancing the performance and speed. Source: usrowing.org