Daniel Boyne - Red Rose Crew: A True Story Of Women, Winning, And The Water

With thanks to the women of the Red Rose Crew and their coach, Harry Parker; Steve Gladstone, Jay Mimier, Sue Ela, Maggie MacLean, and Robert Graves; Alicia Gurney and the research staff at the Henley River and Rowing Museum; The Henley Gazette, Pat and Valerie at the Wheatsheaf Pub, Derek Thurgood, and Angus Robertson; Anita DeFrantz and The Womens Sports Foundation, Nigel Gallaher, Allen Rosenberg, Chris Baillieu, and Bernie Horton; the late Thomas Mendenhall, for his invaluable historical work in rowing, and Thomas Weil, Jr., for his current research; Sports Illustrated and Arthur Grace, for their excellent photos and insights; Karen Mittlestadt at USRowing; my wife, Karen Barss, for all of her help editing; and Tom McCarthy for all of his help and encouragement with the book; and finally David Halberstam, for his heartfelt and wonderful preface to the paperback edition.

I N ROWING, explaining the success of an underrated crew is almost as difficult as accounting for the poor performance of a highly favored one. Harry Parker had always been fascinated by the more mysterious elements that made some boats go fastand others slowdespite the size and experience of the people in them. It was one of the things, in fact, that kept him coaching crew for so long. Sometimes, the parts didnt add up to the whole, despite all the careful calculations.

This womens team, the one he had just watched match the East Germans right down to the wire, was a case where the whole was much greater than the sum of its parts. For anyone in the know, sitting in the stands, this had made the race even more thrilling to watch. No one matched strokes like that with the East Germans, especially not a crew that had come out of nowhere. And what had happened to the Russians?

Second best in the world. The women themselves were just beginning to figure out what theyd done. Claudia Schneider, who spoke fluent German, befriended some of the East German rowers and secretly swapped gear with them behind the boat pavilion. The stroke of the boat, who was retiring that year, explained to her that they were not supposed to trade their precious uniforms. Now they wanted to swap for U.S. gear, a clear indication that American stock had suddenly risen in the rowing world.

In her conversation with the Germans, Claudia also learned that in addition to being twenty pounds heavier than the Americans, they were paid professionals. The stroke explained how after being selected to row, they were given jobs and paid a salary to row for their country, with monetary incentives for winning medals. As Claudia heard this, it made her silver medal feel even more valuable; it made what they had done seem even more impressive.

ONE WEEK LATER over the same Nottingham course, Harry and some of his women watched the reverse scenario occur, as the U.S. mens heavyweight team, favored to win, rowed to a disappointing fifth-place finish. The outcome was nearly the opposite of the womens results. The womens eight had beaten all but one boat; the heavyweight men had been beaten by all but one. It was a difficult day for Al Rosenberg and his former world champions, ending appropriately with rainfall.

However, even a silver medal for the men would not have meant what it did for the women that day Were coming up from the bottom, one of the women explained to a reporter, and the men are coming down from the top.

A year before at the Worlds, Al Rosenberg had given his team an inspirational speech about how fortunate they were to have the opportunity to be the best in the world. No doctor or lawyer could ever make that claim, but an athlete could, however fleeting it might be. Rosenberg was an eloquent speaker who could rouse his athletes with his well-chosen words. In the same speech, he told them that nothing but a first-place finish would satisfy them, that if they won silver instead of gold, they would wake up the next morning and know that someone had rowed a better race than they had, and they would regret it. The speech had been powerful and effective. They had won the gold that year.

It was the sort of speech Parker could not, and would not, make to a team. He always trusted his crews to row as hard as they could, and never questioned their willingness to do so. Results didnt necessarily reflect effort; they could reflect many other variables, most of which, he felt, fell in his domain. When a Harvard crew lost or didnt row up to their ability, he was much more inclined to blame himself, to look back through his logbooks and see where he had failed.

In the case of this crew, there were absolutely no regrets. A silver medal for them was as good as gold, and they had honored him with their remarkable performance. They had survived the same rigors as any Parker-made crew, experienced the same high level of success. He still could not claim to have the fastest crew in the world, but the women had provided him with just the sort of rowing experience that he loved: to take an unheralded, even ignored, group of young rowers and make them into a successful team. It made the success all the more sweet and made him eager to coach them again. Rosenberg could keep the U.S. mens team; Parker wanted to continue coaching the women.

A few weeks after Nottingham, he did compose a letter expressing these thoughts, and it was one that each of the rowers would cherish for the rest of their lives, along with the roses and the silver medals:

To the whole Red Rose gang:

I realized shortly after I left you all in the dusk at Nottingham that I owed you a much better goodbye than I had come up with.

I also want to let you know how terribly proud I was of you, not only for the superb race you rowed in the final, but also for the way you raced in the heat and the repechage and handled yourselves through the whole regatta. It was a real pleasure to be associated with you.

And despite my efforts not to fully admit as much, you all must have realized that I thoroughly enjoyed working with you throughout the summer. You rowed well, and very hard, which helped, but you were also very nice people, which helped a lot more

The letter went on to describe Parkers plans for them the following summer, when the women would compete in their first Olympics. Although it was yet to be decided who would coach, Parker stated that he was ready and willing to do so. There was no mention of him wanting to coach the U.S. men. He sketched out a rough timetable for next years camp and told them he would find a way to work it around his Harvard duties. A tone of genuine excitement infused the letter, a notion that this was just the beginning for them all:

Next year. The Womens Olympic Rowing Committee meets Oct. 3rd, probably in Seattle, but possibly in the East. They will decide then how the 76 Olympic Team will be chosen: methods, dates, coaches, etc. If you have any thoughts, now is the time to let someone on the committee know of them.

I am assuming that the committee will want to continue the National Team program for the eight and am prepared to coach it if asked. And if a likely conflict with the HarvardYale race can be resolved.

It may mean that the camp will start in Cambridge about May 16th and that I will have to be absent from June 5th to either June 12 or June 19. Selection could begin in May, and either be concluded by June 5th or not until after June 12th or 19th. It is obviously not an ideal situation, but neither was this years and we managed to make it work.

I hope that you all will be interested in competing for seats in the eight again and will be prepared to work just as hard to earn them. That is the only way the boat will be as fast as it was this year. If it is to be faster , each of you will have to find some way to row a little