It’s 7:30 at UNH. A student is lacing up for a jog. Another is taking the first sips of his French roast. Still another is just waking, peeling her face from the textbook on which she nodded off the night before.
About a mile from campus, some of the student body’s earliest risers are coming in from a two-hour workout on the Oyster River. A workout that began in darkness at 5:45 a.m. A workout that, two hours and seven nautical miles later, is only halfway done—they’ll lift and run and row again later at the Hamel Rec Center.
These students are members of the men’s and women’s rowing teams, and, for them, pre-dawn is prime time for practicing sprints on a placid river.
“I like waking up and getting out on the water,” says Jason Reuter ’16, a member of the men’s varsity team. “Usually I get back to my dorm, and my roommate’s still asleep—I’ve done more before 8 a.m. than most do all day.”
The teams’ season doesn’t start until spring, but training is a year-round affair, and this weekend both crews will get a tune up of sorts, racing at the Head of the Charles Regatta in Cambridge, Mass. Alison Smith ’16, co-captain of the varsity women’s team, says having boats in the prestigious Head of the Charles, which is celebrating its fiftieth anniversary this year, is “really an honor. It’s a great opportunity to get out and show what UNH is all about.”
David Desaulniers ’16, coxswain for the men’s team, says his crew is shaping up. “We’ve rowed further every day,” he says “Our coach works us hard. It will be good to show other colleges, ‘we’re here, we’re ready for the spring.’”
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Written By:
Tracey Bentley | Communications and Public Affairs
