On Saturday, G4 for Andover Girls Crew pulled four boat lengths ahead to beat Kent by 17 seconds. Andover’s third and second boats lost close races to their Kent opponents, who were more familiar with the twisting course. “The Kent course has two major turns, lots of current and small buoys, making it very hard for the coxswains to steer a good course. Frankly, it was a challenge to even see the course markings at all. A great deal of attention was paid to making sure our boats stayed in the current with the boats from Kent,” said Coach Joe Bouscaren. At the end of the race, G2 sprinted to try to challenge Kent but could not quite overtake its second boat. G1 lost by a significant margin to Kent. Its first boat was stroked by a girl who rowed for the U.S. Junior National Team this past summer, according to Coach Bouscaren. “Each race gives us a new foundation from which we can work off of over the next week in practice,” said Co-Captain Emily Carrolo ’13. “Races are always very telling of how the boat is moving.” Carrolo added, “As the season progresses, we learn more about the girls around us and ourselves as rowers. The fourth boat had an especially fantastic showing this week, which we are all thrilled about. It was the first race for a lot of the girls in that boat, and they obviously have a great season ahead of them.” “I was very proud of how hard our four girls boats raced this early in the season and feel that this season’s influx of strong athletes from other sports has strengthened our team considerably. We can now travel to any other school and match them, strong athlete for strong athlete,” said Bouscaren. Kent has a strong team that always comes out fast, especially in the early parts of the season. Bouscaren said he coached the girls to give each race their all right from the beginning. Andover is still working on solidifying the basics early in the season: balance, rhythm and uniform blade work. “The goal is for each girl in the boat to blend their power application during the drive, then have a quick and clean recovery while allowing the boat to run out between strokes,” said Bouscaren. “Every week our team gets more experienced and faster, and we are definitely on an upward trajectory.” Andover looks forward to the Andover/Exeter Invitational this Saturday, where G1 hopes to improve its 0-2 record.
