I hope you’re all doing well and enjoying your Memorial Weekend. We have some exciting activities planned for the rest of the year and an exciting update on our Nationals boats!

Events

• Fun Practice this Thursday & Friday: Coaches will hold optional and fun practices this Thursday and Friday (weather dependent) for any rower who would like to get on the water this week. Please have the rowers mark their attendance on the team sheet so we can coordinate with the coaches.
• Parent Row & Work Day: Saturday, May 31st from 9:00 a.m. – 1:00 p.m. This is a fantastic opportunity for parents to get a taste of rowing, see what it’s all about and how hard our athletes work during the season. At Sandy Run, parents will go in the boats while the coaches and athletes teach the parents how to row. Ask your athlete what to wear and bring (most likely a dry change of clothes)! We have spots for 12 parents to row, so please sign-up using the SUG if interested. We are combining the Parent Row with a Work Day to get Sandy Run ready for the off-season, so please plan to stay to help. Bring lunch or heavy snacks to keep your energy up! Sign up for the Parent Row.
• End of Year Celebration – Saturday, June 7th from 11:00 a.m. – 2:00 p.m. Our end-of-year celebration and awards will be on Saturday, June 7th at 11:00am-2:00pm at the pavilion at Rose Lane Park (3584 Terrace Dr, Annandale). We ask families to sign up to bring a lunch item to share for our potluck.

SSRA/Nationals Update:

This weekend’s SRAA National Championship regatta brought a mix of challenges and strong efforts across the board. Justice Rowing returned for the first time since 2019, bringing three boats to a competition with 157 individual races to determine champions in 30 events. With strong winds and unusually large waves for rowing, there was a wide variance in the conditions from how close a lane was to the windward shore to hard far down the course one went.

The Boys’s Senior Quad and Girls’s Senior Double both faced tough heats and came in last in their respective heats, but showed determination and resilience through the entire race (SRAA identifies the races slightly differently from VASRA, using the terms “girls” and “boys” instead of “women” and “men”). While disappointing at the time, both boats had terrific seasons to qualify for the exclusive SRAA Championships.

The Girl’s Quad had the standout performance of the regatta, winning their Friday heat by two seconds to advance to the finals on Saturday afternoon. After leading for the entire race in the finals, they caught a crab with 600 meters to go, taking them out of competition for first place, but showed true grit in recovering from the crab and pulling away from the oncoming Germantown Friends quad to take second place. This is our first medal at SRAAs since 2016.

Congratulations to all the rowers for a terrific weekend of racing. See the slideshow at our photo gallery.

Thanks,
Stephanie
Vice President, Justice High School Rowing Boosters