The Rowing Podcast
The Rowing Podcast
Duey Phipps: Showdown With the Kiwis
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I chat with former coxswain Dwight Phillips.
Dwight started his rowing career as a freshman at the University of Washington, going on to become a national champion with the Huskies. In 1971, he was named captain of his team. He would go on to be a coxswain for team USA in the men’s four with at Senior Worlds in 1970, the men’s eight at the Pan Am Games in 1971 (where he won a silver medal), and the men’s pair with at the 1973 Senior World Championship in Moscow, in what was then the USSR. Dwight also served as coach of the men’s lightweight crew at Washington, following his career as a coxswain.
https://blog.foster.uw.edu/o-coxswain-coxswain/
My guest today is a former coxswain. He started his rowing career as a freshman at the University of Washington, going on to become a national champion with the Huskies. In 1971, he was named captain of his team. He would go on to be a Coxswain for Team USA and the Men's Four With at Senior Worlds in 1970, the Men's Eight at the Pan Am Games in 1971, where he won a silver medal, and the men's pair with at the 1973 Senior World Championship in Moscow, in what was then the USSR. He also served as a coach of the Men's Lightweight Crew at Washington, following his career as a coxswain. I'm happy to have on the podcast today Dwight Phillips.
SPEAKER_01Hey Matt, good to hear from you as well. Thanks for the invitation.
SPEAKER_00Absolutely. Uh third time's the charm, right?
SPEAKER_01That's right. Yep. That it is.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. The uh for the folks listening, they probably don't realize this is our third attempt at this interview. It's like the one interview that doesn't want to happen, but uh we're waiting, we're making it happen. So good to have you on finally. Yeah. Um well Dwight, for the folks who don't who don't know you too well, I I'd like to start well at the beginning um to learn a bit about you and before we go and and get to hear about the story that you'd like to share with us today. So where were you born?
SPEAKER_01Uh I was born in Seattle, raised over in Kirkland on the east side of Lake Washington, family of five, meaning mom, dad, older brother, older sister, and me. It was a family, Matt, I guess, that uh was encouraged to be physically active. All three of us. My brother was a uh pretty uh well-regarded wrestler all through high school and college at the UW back when there was wrestling. He was a wet West Coast champion. My sister, um also very physically, she was a PE teacher before she and her husband went into a different business, but she uh got a degree from the UW. We're all three UW grads. She hers was in kinesiology. So anyway, we were, you know, both uh all three of us were just love, some kind of endeavor that involved physical activity.
SPEAKER_00Gotcha. Now, my understanding is earlier on in your you know in your life you were a pretty active runner.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, so I was. I was uh quite active in all sports, you know. Uh granted that was in grade school and just going into junior high school, but yeah, I was I was uh I'd say above average for sure in in running. I was a pretty pretty decent runner, and then things changed.
SPEAKER_00So yeah, I was going to ask, there's there was a uh uh yeah, a moment in your life that uh kind of changed, I guess, the path of your athletic career and and which way you were going to go with sports.
SPEAKER_01It was uh I was 12 years old, and at the time, it was a summertime, I was uh doing a lot of swimming in uh Lake Washington. I was taking a life-saving class at age 12, so uh gives you some indication. I was uh pursuing those kind of goals. And that particular summer, when I was 12, I contracted polio, which for those that maybe are of the younger generation, it was polio was pretty well wiped out. I mean, I had all the vaccines, the sulk vaccine and et cetera, like most people do nowadays. But there's that small percentage, they say, that can still get that. And I did, I I was uh diagnosed with polio, and it affected uh my left leg. Uh everything else, all the extremities, right leg, upper arms, and all that, still very good, but my left leg uh was uh definitely affected by polio. And ever since that time, I've worn a um a leg brace just as a way of getting around. But what that meant, Matt, is it really curtailed uh certainly the ability to run. It didn't really stop me, though, Matt, from pursuing cardio workouts, swimming. I'm a very a lot of scuba diving, pretty much did everything, but certainly running is uh not something I can do now.
SPEAKER_00So given that, you know, I would imagine that uh, you know, like you said, that creates challenges for what sports you can do. How did rowing fit in? You know, where did you get your first exposure to that?
SPEAKER_01I guess it was came in two ways. One in the Northwest, being in Seattle or Greater Seattle, you know, rowing, as you would know, Matt, from your past experience with the UW, it's pretty, pretty well. Uh everybody knows rowing because they see it on Lake Washington, and I did as a kid. So that was one thing. I just saw that sport kind of from a distance. And I lived on Lake Washington, so I even got to see the crew uh back when I was young in in junior high school. But then what really kind of got me into it was as I was approaching college, my brother, who was this really I'll say all-star wrestler, and I I saw how he took to being an academic as well as being an athlete, and I really liked that combination. So I thought, well, what can I do that would be basically be similar to his path? And I started independently kind of looking up this role of a coxswain, but quite honestly, I knew nothing about it. And then I contacted uh just uh randomly picked up the phone and called uh and spoke to Phil Leanderson, who was the head coach at the UW at the time. Phil was quite a gentleman, didn't know me from Adam, and he very politely took my call and I said, Hey, you know, I'm gonna enroll at the UW next year, and uh I understand that you, you know, the supporter rowing has this position called a coxswain. Um, is there any chance I could come down and talk to you about it? He said, We would love to have you. And he was just uh the most uh polite guy to encourage me to come down there. And and I guess you'd say the rest is history. I came down as a freshman.
SPEAKER_00So, you know, a few things with us. What was his reaction when he first met you? Because to be fair, I would imagine from a coach's perspective, a fellow who may not be able to have full use of one of his legs, you know, he wouldn't want to put you at risk out on the boat if the boat flipped and you know you had a problem swimming or something like that. You know, how did he respond to that initially?
SPEAKER_01Um he he was always encouraging. Let's put it, I know that for sure. He was encouraging, and he um deferred to the then freshman coach, Dick Erickson. Dick was uh his uh assistant, Phil was the head coach, Dick was the freshman coach, and so I got introduced to Dick Ericsson. Dick didn't even bat an eye, frankly. I mean, he was just like, let's go. You know, uh it was full steam ahead, and then and now, you know, you have to pass a swimming test. That was no trouble whatsoever for me. I mean, I'm I'm a very, very strong swimmer, so that was no big deal. So it all was kind of a non-event, really.
SPEAKER_00Well, then, you know, that's your exposure running, but what hooked you? I think for any of us who've stuck with the sport for a long time, there was some sort of a light bulb moment or something that really stuck with us that I I mean, in a way, probably helped us all fall in love with the sport really early on. So, what was that for you?
SPEAKER_01You know, it was uh I I think a couple things. Being on the water or in the water, that was one. It just was uh got a little bit of fish in me, I guess. I just love that. But I think the strongest thing, Matt, was um teammates. Just, you know, they were obviously the six twos to six five, six six guys, and I was the the five seven guy. Friendships, friendships all the way. We just developed this bond right when we were grunties, as they're called, freshmen at the UW. I think that's probably been the lifelong uh glue that's um kept me in the sport, basically.
SPEAKER_00So where did where did you go from there?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, it was um kind of a steady eddy being in you know several uh freshman boats and then moving up to, well, the the one of the key things I think was Dick Erickson when our class moved up to sophomores, Dick happened to be appointed to be the head coach at that time. Phil left the the coaching ranks, and Dick took over as varsity coach. So there was a common uh year after year connection with Dick, and he was for collegiately anyway, he was the only coach I ever had. Freshman boats, JV boats, varsity boats, and then had the good fortune of being in some USA boats as well, um, both as a senior and then a fifth-year senior, was when we had that Pan Am boat, the eight that won the trials and went down to South America for the uh Pan American games. Um and then once again, you know, pair width over in the Soviet Union at the time, USSR. I guess I'd have to say it was like starting at the very bottom. You know, there's no question I had the good fortune of teammates that were uh well above average. I mean, we weren't just an average cue, we were a pretty strong group of guys in that class, the class of 70.
SPEAKER_00Did a lot of those guys rise up in the ranks? I know that I guess the reason I'm saying that is I think back to the boys in the boat. You know, a lot of those guys were very good early, almost their freshman year. Yeah. And kind of became varsity, or at least the core of it.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, good point. Um and by the way, uh, when you mentioned boys in the boat, uh being the generation that I was, we we had the good fortune of knowing all the guys that were boys in the boat, because they used to come down to the boat house, uh, the 1936 crew, and um we uh you know we befriended them and vice versa. And uh Bob Mock, the the coxswain of that crew, was somebody that I got to know probably better than the rest of the guys, but because he was a coxswain. Um, but yeah, in our crew, we have one Olympian, uh Chad Rudolph, went on to be on the um U.S. Olympic team in 72. And then each of those boats, Matt, that I happened to be in, we were all UW guys. So the UW 4 with was the USA 4 with. The UW 8 in 71 ended up being the USA 8 and the pair with, same thing. So all of us were huskies. Nowadays it's different, as you know, because it's all done by camp, um, the camp boat, especially for the eight and the straight four. But um back then it was it predated the camp approach. It was done by trials.
SPEAKER_00Got it. So you could pretty much, you know, again, for maybe some of the younger listeners who don't really realize what the dynamic was, but you could essentially show up to trials, if I'm not mistaken, with not not your best mates, but maybe, you know, a boat that you guys had put together and and have a go. I mean, uh, what other pieces were there? I mean, what was the what was the not the buy-in, but you know what I mean? What was the price of admission, if you will, to to do it?
SPEAKER_01There wasn't any real restriction on if you wanted to go to the trials, you could go to the trials. So it was pretty open-ended at that time. Um they later converted to having some some time standards. Um, I think in 73, uh, there was a time standard you had to meet in order to go to the trials. But before that, it was just, hey, you know, if you want to go there and give it a go, you could.
SPEAKER_00You know, you mentioned it before, and I didn't really ask you about it, but um, what did you learn from Bob Mock? I mean, I imagine that was probably pretty cool um for a younger coxswain kind of making your way up to learn from a gold medalist.
SPEAKER_01The one thing I remember about Bob, he he he always seemed very serious. Uh, I don't think, and maybe it's just that I was young and he was certainly, but he there was no no question about his uh focus on uh the seriousness of what we were all trying to do. It wasn't a lot of uh frivolity and joking around. He was and he was he ended up being a referee. He ended up coaching as well back at MIT. So he had that uh elder statesman, if you will, uh approach, and he took it very seriously.
SPEAKER_00You also did some coaching, and I know this, you know, you and I have talked about it a little bit, but we've never actually talked about it that much.
SPEAKER_01I did. Um Dick Erickson asked me if I would be the lightweight coach, and then back again, change of times, but the UW had a men's lightweight program for a few years. I took over the lightweight program from Rick Clothier. Rick had uh been the lightweight coach, and then he moved to be the freshman coach. And when he did that, Dick asked me if I would uh take over the uh lightweight job, and I coached the lightweights for three years. You know, unfortunately, as you know, the the funding sources for lightweight rowing, especially on the West Coast, has always been a struggle. And athletic departments just have a darn hard time justifying having lightweight teams when there's really no serious West Coast men's lightweight. You have to go back to where you were, Matt, back on the East Coast uh to get it. Consequently, uh lightweight rowing just kind of faded from the West Coast. But I did coach. I coached the men's lightweight.
SPEAKER_00So Rick Clothier didn't maybe I've got this wrong, but didn't he end up didn't he end up at Navy? Wasn't he the head coach at Navy for a long time?
SPEAKER_01Yes, yeah, he did. Um when he left Washington after his coaching of the freshman, uh he went directly back to the Naval Academy as the head coach, and he stayed there. God, I want to well, he's still there, actually. Uh he's working for the Naval Academy now. Uh, but he was the 30-plus year head coach of the Naval Academy.
SPEAKER_00You know, I gotta tell you, I'm always uh the more I I discuss the history with people and talk about previous coaches and rowers, I'm amazed. I mean, I know it's a small world, but I am amazed how many people have come out of the Conaber Shell House. I mean for real. That's another guy I didn't even know. Yeah. You know, I mean, everything from um who was another I mean Kai Ebright, yeah, Cal. Yeah, who's like a renowned coach.
SPEAKER_01Yep.
SPEAKER_00Used to be a coach at UW. You just told me about Reclothier. I mean, my God, it's kind of crazy, actually, how many folks have been there.
SPEAKER_01Well, here's another little tidbit. Um, Fred Schock, who's a teammate of mine, uh, who's now head of the head of the Charles, his dad, Dutch Schock, was the alternate in the boys in the boat eight. So he went over to Berlin with the boys in the boat. This is Fred's dad now. After he finished rowing at the U Dub, Dutch Schock went back to Princeton and was the head. Exactly.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_01Yep, he was the head coach at Princeton. I guess the legacy lives on because nowadays, when the Cal Washington race takes place, it is the Shock Cup, named after Fred's dad, Dutch Shock. Um, but he was a longtime Princeton coach, to your point. He came out of Washington, he was a Washington Norseman.
SPEAKER_00And you know who's another person? Actually, now that you mention Princeton, this is just dawning on me. Another person who is a Washington graduate, Lori Dauphin, who's the women's head coach at Princeton and has been for quite some time.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, yeah. Yeah, yep.
SPEAKER_00I don't mean uh not I'm not trying to peddle the, you know, the flat the UW flag too much, but I mean it's actually it's just uncanny how many folks have been in that boathouse. I mean, even even Brian Volpenhein, who's now the coach at Penn, sure spent a year at UW. Um, so did Wyatt, who was the Dartmouth head coach, same thing. Yep. Um, I mean it's really it's kind of crazy. That's all. It's just like, wow, there's been a lot of folks who've gone through that boathouse. Yep. Um, pretty cool. Ascension to the Rowing Podcast is the idea of story. And as somebody who's been in the sport at a very high level and has seen a lot of races, I imagine that you've got many stories. So can you share with us a personal experience in this in the sport that left a strong and hopefully positive impact on you, maybe those around you? And how did it change you?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, thanks. I gave this some thought. And there are, for any coxswain, there's probably endless stories. Some are good stories, and some are maybe the challenges that we all faced as a coxswain. But the one that kind of comes to mind that seemed to endure and has left uh uh a rowing as well as a non-rowing impression on me was the summer of 70. After the IRA win, Dick uh kept our kept the eight together and wanted to enter the trials for the world championships in St. Catharines. And so in the summer of 70, he came up with this idea, Dick did, that the New Zealand national team was coming over to raid, they were the national team from uh that were Kiwis, and they were gonna represent New Zealand at the St. Catharines World Championships. And they were coming into the Bay Area, that's where they were landing in San Francisco, and Dick uh and Rusty Robertson, he was the head coach of the New Zealand at the time, they got to talking. Uh it was Dick's effort to say, hey, why don't we bring this uh hotshot Washington crew down and we will do just this dual race on the Oakland estuary against the New Zealand national team. As I pause and think about that, Matt, I don't think we, this collegiate, you know, good collegiate crew really knew what a national team was really like. I think we were naive. Uh, because none of us in our Washington boat had ever been on a national team before. We were all, you know, we were a veteran crew, but we were still collegiate guys. And so we did. We went down there, flew down to the Bay to San Francisco, and went to the Oakland Restuary Saturday morning race, I don't know, 10 o'clock in the morning. And it was perfect conditions. What we noticed when we kind of befriended the the Kiwis, which they they seemed a bit older than we were. They weren't uh what we would call college guys, they were certainly more veteran than we were, but we still didn't know a whole lot about them other than they were representing New Zealand.
SPEAKER_00And um had you heard anything about their accolades or their racing or anything at all before you met them?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, we had. We we did a little bit of background check, and we knew that they were regarded as one of the contenders for the upcoming world championships, but there was really only uh there was one name that probably everyone talked about was the East Germans, and that was back when there was an East German crew, uh it was West Germany and East Germany, and the mystique about the East Germans was probably the most talked-about thing, you know, that man, this East German crew is hot. But the Kiwis were also up there, you know, thinking they would give them a challenge. So we knew we were up against a a well-regarded crew. That part we did know. Just to give you a quick synopsis of the race, if if you're interested, um we yeah, we lined up and um starter started us, and we were prepared as good as we could possibly be for a full race, you know, typical start, typical get it down to race cadence, mid-course cadence, etc. So we weren't lacking in race strategy. But when we went off the line, oh, and the other thing I should tell you is our crew that year, we weren't really known as a fast starting crew. We were a good crew, and we always won our races, but we were more of a second thousand meter crew than we were a first thousand. And um, we got off the line and you know, I looked over. And God, I was just like, you gotta be kidding me. We're up, you know, several seats in the first 500 meters over this um Kiwi boat. One, we weren't known to be fast starters, and this was a highly regarded cruise, so we were um just ecstatic over that. And then reality set in. Um, it's the best way I can describe it. Um the the the Kiwis understroked us, and I was keeping track of what I we were rowing, was keeping track of what they were rowing, and they were probably one or two beats below us, and they went through us. Um we were probably 36-ish, somewhere in that range, strokes per minute, and they were around 34 to 33, even, but just machine-like and very quiet. There wasn't any noise coming out of the Kiwi boat. The coxswain was uh back, this was back in the day of megaphones. You didn't hear anything. Uh, there wasn't any uh shouting or any taking big tens or anything like that, but they were just like a um a machine and they went through us, and the end result was they beat us by it was three-quarters of a length, maybe even close to a length, as I recall, but it was clear they knew what they were doing. They they really knew what they were doing, and we talked to them afterwards, and turns out they didn't take a start. They basically went off the line at mid-course pace. Um here we I mean, talk about confidence. Uh they they they knew what they were doing. Um and they just kept it. They just kept it and they kept it and steady eddy, and um they didn't get uh rattled in any way, shape, or form. But they were the I I I smile thinking about them, Matt, because they were the coolest guys. They were average age, probably twenty five to twenty-eight years old. I think there was one guy that was over 30 in the boat, comparing that to us, and we were you know, the oldest guy in our boat was probably 22 to 23. Um, so several years of experience different than us. And what did that mean to us? You know, I I'll give Dick Erickson credit for this because you know, you could take a moment like that with a crew and say, God, we just got our butt kicked, but we didn't really feel that way. Um we really felt like it wasn't a defeat as much as it was a learning experience. And that's kind of what I take away, Matt, from that experience is there's so many analogies in rowing to the rest of the life you lead and how you go into sales challenges or business challenges, and you always want to be the most prepared you can be, but you also have to have a bit of uh humility in um accepting the fact that there's probably somebody out there better than you are, that's maybe more experienced, more well trained. Um and that to me is what I think about probably all my adult life is um taking a moment that could have been devastating from a you know a psychological point of view, but turning it into a learning experience. And the only way I can explain that, Matt, is that our coach, Dick, didn't let us think of it as a defeat. He he you know, he referred to it as the men versus the boys, and we thought we were the men, but in reality, we were the boys. Uh you know what I mean? You you you develop a certain amount of uh confidence and cockiness, if there, if you will. And we had that. We had some swagger, uh, because we were, you know, basically collegiate national champs. But there it was that there was another league that we weren't prepared for. Um and the following years, 71, 72, 73, um, those that moment I think really made us what we were the next year in 71, and we went to the trials, and we won the trials, and we were the USA eight. And I want to go back just one second. That Kiwi boat, that eight, did go up to St. Catharines, and they got a bronze medal uh that year. So they were a medalist. The the East Germans did win. The East Germans uh just they they were uh you know a lot of discussion about them, about their how they won, uh doping versus not doping, I'm sure you've heard that. Um but regardless, they were they were the gold medalists, and the Kiwis got a bronze, and then in 1972, that eight that we had lost to down on the estuary, uh, won the gold medal at the 72 Olympics. So if there's any solace for us, is that you know, we got beat by a pretty darn good crew. Um that was that was a legendary crew for the um for the New Zealanders.
SPEAKER_00Do you uh you know, do you did you keep in touch with any of those guys for any length of time afterwards?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, a couple of the oarsmen, uh Wevo Veldman uh was the seven man, and uh Simon Dickey uh was coxswain. He's you know he's pretty legendary. He unfortunately passed away. Just I I read about it about three years ago, and he was young. He was a young coxswain, younger than I was when we raced one another. Uh, but he went on to kind of legendary status for the uh for the New Zealanders. And I think the cool thing about that New Zealand crew is they speak English, and and there was back in the day when you would almost develop a pen pal relationship, you know. So yeah, we did. We had some good friendships there.
SPEAKER_00If your closest friends could only describe you using three words, meaning three distinct adjectives, which words do you hope that they would use for you?
SPEAKER_01Um hope and actually reality, I would say, maybe both the same. Um steady, um would be one. Um kind of a hyphenated one would be risk taker. I'm not afraid to take risks. And uh team. It's all about the team.
SPEAKER_00What jolt you out of bed every morning? What gets you excited emotionally and spiritually to you know attack your day or attack the mission?
SPEAKER_01You know, I I would say uh I I I'm still hooked at this age that I am with some form of physical exercise. So the thing that uh it will sound exaggerated to say it, but it's not, I I get some kind of uh exercise in every single day. And until this coronavirus thing hit, I was I was swimming every morning before work. So I'd go in and get a you know, a good mile in the in the swimming pool. Um, and that to me makes all the difference in the day, you know, just getting a good bit of exercise.
SPEAKER_00Well, on the flip side of that, what is something that really kind of turns you off?
SPEAKER_01You know, I was thinking about that, Matt, I think uh it's people that are um self-righteous, you know, just interacting with in the business world with people that maybe have that kind of attitude. That one is uh hard to deal with.
SPEAKER_00Who is somebody that you admire in rowing?
SPEAKER_01Well, the way I look at that, it's more of a plural than a singular. Um, and it goes back to the Washington uh method of building a team. And I think the guys that I admire the most are the guys in the 2v, 3v, and below that persevere day in, day out, push the next boat up, push the next boat up. They're never in the varsity. They many of them go four or five years and they never make the the big boat. And yet they come out of that program with every bit as much um strength and um mental toughness than anybody. And so I I just admire every year, even to this day, when we go back for alumni gatherings and uh varsity boat club banquet, it's those guys that are the I guess you'd call them the unsung heroes. That those are my heroes.
SPEAKER_00I feel like when it comes to long-term, you know, lifelong contributors and fans and supporters of teams and even of the sport, I feel as though an overwhelming majority of them are actually 2v, 3v, 4v guys.
SPEAKER_01Yep.
SPEAKER_00Which is interesting.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_00You know, I mean, one of the some of the biggest contributors to, I mean, hell, my team back at Cornell and um, you know, at at UW were those guys. Yeah, they weren't necessarily varsity guys, but God, they were passionate. God, exactly.
SPEAKER_01That's that's a key word. Passionate. I mean, to think about coming down every day, and the weather is crappy, you know, it's raining, it's blowing, and you're in the third boat, you know, every single day. That that's a gutsy person.
SPEAKER_00What about uh what about boat class? What's your favorite? I mean, you've been in all of them. You've been in the eight, you've been in the four, you've been in a cox pair, which, you know, uh that's a very rare boat today. It is a very rare boat. What's your favorite?
SPEAKER_01Um, you know, you know, I guess anytime you get on a national team, that's your favorite, but the reality is the eight, I'd have to say the eight, it's just um it's got so many moving parts, and um it it's um it's it's just got everything. Nine guys trying to go fast.
SPEAKER_00What about racing distance? You know, there's um you know, you've probably done many. I mean, you've you've I imagined the head of the Charles and you've done sprint pieces and what have you. You've probably done really long rows. I mean, you know, the water never freezes here in Seattle, so you could you could really go almost forever. What's your favorite distance and why?
SPEAKER_01It I guess it really comes down to the role that I had, which was the coxswain. And um, so I'm I I like the the head races. Um, you know, head of the Charles, I've done that eight or nine times, uh, and and I coached a couple crews at the head of the Charles. Um, I just like that. The strategy, the turning, the bridges, the you know, passing crews, and there's something about that that it's a coxswain's dream.
SPEAKER_00What about uh, you know, since we're talking about racing, what about a pre-race mantra? You know, do you feel like you had a pre-race kind of preparation thing that really got you in the zone and got you prepared? Um, something that was really special to you?
SPEAKER_01You know, I I I'd have to say I think just the focus, just, you know, you you you do week and week and weekend of training, training, training, and then on race day, you have to put it all together. And um I'd have to say that what I would say to myself and ultimately to the team is uh the focus. Just we've got to focus because there's a lot of distractions. You know, you get into some of these big races, and there's media things, and there's the fan base that comes out, moms and dads and aunts and uncles and all that. But on race day, I think it's just channeling all that stuff to the sidelines and staying focused on the job.
SPEAKER_00Do you have a favorite race course or regatta? And why?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I've got two. Um as we mentioned just a second ago, the head of the Charles. I just uh for a couple reasons. One, it's kind of legendary. Plus, my buddy Fred is running the thing, so it's that that's special to have him be in charge of that. So for a long course, uh you know, a head course, I'd stay the head of the Charles. But then on the uh the 2K stuff, uh, you know, the Mott Lake course, um, Matt, is special to me, and it's probably a biased answer, but there's nothing like um the Windamura Cup coming down there and seeing literally thousands of people in that last 500 meters when it's just echoing off the uh the cement walls there. That's very, very special.
SPEAKER_00Well, to this day, you know, you're at least the last time I checked, you're still very much uh involved in the rowing community and especially with the um you know alumni community at UW. Why are you still hooked? Is it any different than the reason that you were hooked initially?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, no, that's a good point. I think that uh why I'm hooked is uh and it's different now. Uh used to be just the you know the getting in the boat and the the physical nature of that. Now it's not so much physical as it is the um seeing the younger generation take on the sport, it makes me smile every single time. In fact, I just texted Callahan the other day about uh wanting to get back down to Converse Shellhouse, if for no other reason, just the vibrancy of um the um the people in the sport. And um and I'd say too that uh giving back is something that I'm saying it to myself as much as I am to others, too. I think it's a sport where uh we get a lot out of it, and for that reason, we we've got to give a lot back to it. So I'm doing volunteer work um on some international regattas at the U-23s and at the worlds. Um I'll go I'll go to various places and um I'll drive a launch for the officials. Um absolutely love it.
SPEAKER_00But it's you know it's just really I didn't know you're doing that.
SPEAKER_01Yep, yep, yep. Um did it three times down in Sarasota for the U-23s for the World Championships and for the NC2A women's championships. And I was scheduled to go.
SPEAKER_00Oh, but that was a ton of fun.
SPEAKER_01Oh, yeah. And I was scheduled to go over to Slovenia this uh summer for the U-23 worlds, but then of course everything got canceled. Um, so anyway, um I'm hooked on it. There's no question. I mean, I think it's it's the seeing what it can do for people. That's that's what makes me smile now.
SPEAKER_00If you could give one piece of advice to each of the following people who is you know looking to excel in the sport of rowing, what would you say to a rower, a coxswain, and a coach individually?
SPEAKER_01You know, I think the rower and the coach, um I would I guess I would say just what I said a minute ago is to give back, uh, to not be taking things away from the sport, but to be giving to the sport. For the coxswain, I think the thing I would advise to younger coxswains is to uh know that there's so much to learn and to be a sponge and just listen and talk to veteran coxswains. Um because each time you go out there, you're learning something. I'm I'm not kidding, uh and I'm not exaggerating that. I think every race you do, you learn something new about you know stroke rating and backing into the starting blocks and uh the race strategy that has to be changed in mid-course that you didn't think was going to happen, but it happened. So I think just uh being a good listener um is as much as good as being a good talker to uh to a coxswain and and learn as much as you can.
SPEAKER_00Well, Dwight, um it's been great talking to you. Uh it took us it took us a few tries and uh a few false starts, but um we figured it out and I'm glad to have had you on. Um any final thoughts or uh things to close us out?
SPEAKER_01Uh no, just a thank you. I think uh getting a rowing podcast um is is a good idea. I think it's a great idea and and get various people to uh contribute whatever uh they've gotten out of the sport. And so thank you so much, Matt, for doing this.