One for the money...
Ready or not, it's racing season. I'm not talking about spring season but racing season itself. We kick off this weekend with our annual "Governors Cup" regatta. A bit of history, I believe that the race is named after the coffee house in Salem with the same name, not because Salem is the seat of government in the state of Oregon. But I could be wrong.
The regatta itself has transformed into a dual between us and the top Division III school on the west coast, University of Puget Sound to which I say, I've got some mixed feelings. On one hand Willamette definitely needs a strong rival and UPS is indeed that school. They've gone to NCAAs for the last 8 years straight I believe, have finished 2nd, 3rd, and 4th three or four times. I tend to forget. They are a very strong program and are standing in the way of the team getting a bid.
The down side do this is that the regatta has in many ways devolved. When I started as a freshmen and I believe even as a sophomore, the Gov's Cup race was a massive regatta where programs from California, Oregon and Washington descended upon our humble section of the river and we raced. There was a pancake feed and for a while it was quite the race to come see, set up perfectly so spectators could view the final 600 meters of the race, a rarity to say the least.
Typically I am more excited about kicking off the spring season but right now I am just happy to get there. We've had more than our fair share of problems to start this season and instead of running, I feel as though we're limping across the start. We've had illness, injury and equipment issues not to mention internal team issues that seem to spring up whenever we take a step forward. Still, I think that a lot of this has been a "hold on till..." portion of the season and now that we're really getting underway and the athletes can see the races stacking up - light at the end of the tunnel so to speak - things should hopefully start turning around.
We shall see. Right now I'd like a clean bill of health and clear skies for Saturday.
The regatta itself has transformed into a dual between us and the top Division III school on the west coast, University of Puget Sound to which I say, I've got some mixed feelings. On one hand Willamette definitely needs a strong rival and UPS is indeed that school. They've gone to NCAAs for the last 8 years straight I believe, have finished 2nd, 3rd, and 4th three or four times. I tend to forget. They are a very strong program and are standing in the way of the team getting a bid.
The down side do this is that the regatta has in many ways devolved. When I started as a freshmen and I believe even as a sophomore, the Gov's Cup race was a massive regatta where programs from California, Oregon and Washington descended upon our humble section of the river and we raced. There was a pancake feed and for a while it was quite the race to come see, set up perfectly so spectators could view the final 600 meters of the race, a rarity to say the least.
Typically I am more excited about kicking off the spring season but right now I am just happy to get there. We've had more than our fair share of problems to start this season and instead of running, I feel as though we're limping across the start. We've had illness, injury and equipment issues not to mention internal team issues that seem to spring up whenever we take a step forward. Still, I think that a lot of this has been a "hold on till..." portion of the season and now that we're really getting underway and the athletes can see the races stacking up - light at the end of the tunnel so to speak - things should hopefully start turning around.
We shall see. Right now I'd like a clean bill of health and clear skies for Saturday.
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