November 9, 1998

CHAPEL HILL, N.C.--The University of North Carolina crew acquired a couple of new boats over the summer, which gave coach Joel Furtek plenty of time to ponder the program's first season. The new hulls, you see, came from New Haven, Conn., and the oars from Durham, N.H., which meant a 50 hour round trip drive from Chapel Hill. "I love trips like that because the phone can't ring and there's no paperwork to be done," says Furtek, who made the journey alone, towing the boat trailer and spending nights in the back seat of the Chevy truck. "It's a chance to reflect on what has already happened and plan what's ahead."

Here's what has already happened: After its first season as a varsity sport, the 28th at North Carolina, the Tar Heel rowing team has to its credit a Southern Championship, a Central Region Championship and an NCAA bronze medal. Certainly those are amazing accomplishments for a fledgling team, but Furtek found himself less-than-satisfied while roaring up I-95. The team had surpassed the goals it set at the start of the season, back in September of 1997, but had not met the new goal it set in March, which was to send an eight to the NCAA championship. The team fell just short, sending a four. "The fact that we got to taste the NCAAs is really motivating," says senior Lucienne Papon, who competed in the bronze-medal boat. "We rowed with the best of the best and saw a lot of athletes and programs there that really impressed us."

With that experience in mind, the 1998-99 team goals have been set significantly higher. Furtek, however, admits he didn't have a lot of say in the matter. "Last year, I was telling them what to expect," he says. "This year it's the opposite. Now I'm asking them, What do we expect? What are our goals?'"

At one of the team's weekly meetings, on a Tuesday night in September just before the first full practice of the fall, the 26 varsity rowers gathered to answer those questions. They sat in a circle on the floor, and spent 90 minutes hashing out just how bold their goals should be. They decided to shoot high, setting as their target a trip to the 1999 NCAA championships. This time Carolina hopes to qualify as a team, which only the top ten crews in the country will do. "It's going to be a lot of work," sophomore Dana Peirce says, "but if we're not shooting that high, what are we doing?"

This team began at a starting line much different than last year's, when none of the Carolina rowers had collegiate varsity experience. "Last year, no one knew what to expect," says senior captain and coxswain Sam Hermitte. "We didn't know each other and we didn't have a sense of the competition. We were at the bottom of a huge learning curve. Now we have a better sense of what's a realistic goal, or what's unrealistic but worth shooting for."

As Carolina grows in experience, the program is expanding in another significant way. An alumna has donated funding to start a sculling program, which will be up and rowing by the end of the fall season. As a part of the rowing program, sculling should enhance training for fours and eights and help rowers prepare to compete in elite sculling. Furtek also hopes it will bolster the presence of sculling on the collegiate level.

Regardless of the type boat, the Tar Heels' training this season will all be pointed toward Sacramento, Calif, site of the 1999 NCAA Championships May 28-30. Ergometer training is no exception and the team has set a goal of rowing an extra 4 million meters, roughly the distance from Chapel Hill to Sacramento. With six weekly practice sessions plus three weight room workouts the Carolina crew already has a full schedule, but no one is complaining about the extra work. "When you break it down, it's only about 20 minutes per person per day," Papon says. "It's definitely a commitment, but it keeps our eyes on the goal every day. It is a tough goal, but there was no other goal for us to have. We're at Carolina."