Hello Alumni,
This year's Dad Vail regatta marked another successful campaign for Georgia Tech Crew but the event was certainly overshadowed by the tragic death of a Boston College oarsman, Scott Laio. If you had not heard, Boston College had just won the men's Light Eight when Scott, sitting in bow, passed out. The 2 man in front of him tried to perform CPR in the boat and life saving efforts were continued on land by Paul Savell (Lehigh Coach and long time friend of Rob and Tech Crew) but the EMTs were unable to revive him. No official cause of death has been released but the early speculation is that he had an undetected heart condition. The rowing community is a close one and I can tell you we've all been effected by the loss. Many of you have had some incredibly close races with Boston College (as recently as last year) and it is no stretch to say that they've always been a program that has showed sportsmanship and helped motivate us to our best. Slim Price pulled this from the BC website:
In lieu of flowers, the Laio family asks that donations be sent to:
Scott Laio Memorial Fund of Boston College Men's Crew
Boston College Rowing
Scott Laio Memorial Fund
140 Commonwealth Ave.
Chestnut Hill, MA 02467
I plan on making a contribution and would encourage you to do the same on behalf of GT Crew.
On to more pleasant things: For the third time in three years, Georgia Tech left the Dad Vail with a gold medal performance, this time in the Men's light 4+. The boat was 1) Cameron Troxel, 2) Brian Waters 3) Shane Bechler 4) John Kaptyn and c) Theresa Mara. This was Brian
Waters' second gold at the Dad Vail making him the first Tech rower to repeat gold. Tech was behind for only a few strokes, pulling away early in the race after some rough strokes to stay ahead of Fordham who raced to second. The men's champ eight came in with high hopes after racing eventual champ Michigan tough in the heats but was hampered in the semis due to illness. The boat did regroup though and ended up taking home a second place finish in the petite, eighth over all.
In the men's novice light eight, Tech repeated last year's performance taking second to a very strong St. Joseph's crew. This was a 2 boat race but St. Joe's was able to adjust to the windy conditions a bit better than we were allowing them to finish ahead by about a boat. Still a great result for these guys and I can tell you that Rob is looking forward to rolling that talent into a smoking fast light eight next year.
For the first time since 1999, we were able to place two Varsity women's boats in the Dad Vail grand final. In 99' it was the heavy four and pair that made it through (finishing with a silver and bronze respectively); this time it was the light four and pair. In the light four, we raced a hard race but came in fifth with no help from a very messy and windy lane 6. In the pair, some steering problems kept us from getting our rhythm and we were never able to fight back to medal contention, so my two sophomores finished the race in fifth. Still all these girls went through a lot this year and there were 20 or so other schools that would have loved to be where we were. This makes four straight years that I've had a crew in the final at the Dad Vail and I couldn't be more proud to be associated with such an incredible group.
We also raced a Men's pair, Women's novice eight, and Men's novice four. Each of these boats faced eventual medalists early on in their races. For the novice squads in particular, I am excited because there are some extremely strong kids in these boats that are going to keep us a force well into the future.
Keep your eyes open for more news about Tech crew in the alumni magazine - Neil McGahee, a major contributor to this publication (forgive me if I posted an incorrect title) had a photographer at the Dad Vail to capture the event for the Georgia Tech community at large. Not many rowing programs are represented to the general alumni population the way Georgia Tech Crew is to the Yellow Jacket alum so we are quite grateful and flattered that so much interest is shown to our student athletes.
There is quite a bit of activity planned for the boathouse this summer as we work to improve the facility and maintain our fleet. We have some very exciting things in the works for you alumni and as always, for our athletes. So we now transition to a rather active off season but keep your eyes open for news throughout summer. We will again be asking for your help as we continue to update our fleet and give our rowers every chance at success. Thanks as always for all your help and I hope to see many of your at Moes and Joes in a few weeks for the second version of the alumni happy hour.
Ethan
