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Any rowers out there?

This might seem a bit odd, but I have never come across another gay rower in the UK!

Either we dont exist, or Ive not been to the right regattas.

I was wondering what are people's experiences of being gay and a rower? At the moment mine is a rather lonely one.

I suggest you visit the Gay + Lesbian Rowing Federation website: http://www.glrf.info/ It maybe a good way to connect with other UK rowers. Cheers!

Er as I put in my other rowing post...there doesnt seem to be any G&LRF club/organisation in the UK any more..not for three years or more?

For the UK I can provide no help, but gay rowers exist in the US and NYC. NY has a gay rowing association, although I think they are now searching for a boathouse. Also, having rowed in college, I know a good handful of guys I rowed with that are gay. Of course, in college as rowers none of us were gay . . . apparently rowers aren't gay until after college! :P

I have no rowing experience but am very interested in learning. Are there any teams or training for new rowers in NYC? Specifically gay ones?

I don't know how it is in the US and UK, but in Canada it seems like half of every club is gay and the other half are on the dl. :)

Any other Canadian rowers out there?

I went to Brock University in St.Catharines and rowed throughout my days there. I rowed bow in the 8's. They wanted to move me to 5 seat, I refused cause I liked the guy in front of me. I had a blast and yep there were a few homos in our boats.
BTW we were so bad in freshman year, the highschool girls used to beat us-well it wasn't that we were so bad but the HS girls were that good. Nah we sucked anyway.

LOL!

Sounds like my mens lightweight four. Get beaten by schools and the girls each time...due to ego and not putting enough time in on the water, in the gym or being a team.

The girls I coach have come from nothing to regatta winning and put in the hours and gell as a crew. Its odd the two differant ethos they have.

Dude... there are plenty of homo rowers around...!

what club are you?

At my school, the lightweights were known as the gay team on campus, and the heavyweights (which I was on) were not too far behind. And a lot of the guys went on to schools in the UK (Oxford and what not)....

any (other) gay rowers in cambridge?

Im a gay Rower in Leeds but I rowin London too

I say row, well Im a cox really.

I'm a little late arriving, but just wanted to say happy Power Tens to everyone. Never a school rower here, but rowed in clubs on the Hudson river and got a chance to row the Head of the Charles back in the day. Amazing experience.

Both sweeps and sculls here (swing both ways), bow seat in sweeps, double mostly with sculls, but the quad was my favorite boat.

Haven't rowed in quite some time tho. Sigh.

K

PS Ant, coxes are rowers too. Annoying rowers, of course, but still rowers. J/K

Coxes? Annoying? lOL!

Vital part of the team. In the UK tend to be both the guy who stears and also coach as well, in adition to the coach on the bank/launch alongside! I love it! :-)

I have met coxswains that are only mildly annoying, and some that are even charming -- some are members of this site... one has even posted on this thread. Are you dying of suspense yet?



K

I love cox.

Ok, so it was obvious. Sue me.

jprichva saidI love cox.

Ok, so it was obvious. Sue me.

You'll be hearing from my lawyers first thing in the morning.

LOL

Well rowing is just full of homo-erotic terminology

Cox
Stroke
Shaft
Hard Finishes.

etc etc etc.

There was pile of them at henly, sadly my brother made me swear oaths to the effect I wouldn't sleep with any of them

Guess I seem to be joining this topic a bit late but glad to offer some insight on gay rowers and rowing in the UK, Canada, and the US... including Dallas.

Brian here - I run GLRF and our second largest membership by country is the UK. We have members from all over England. The biggest concentration seem to be in London but we have members in Leeds, Manchester, Nottingham, Cambridge, Oxford, Brighton, Norwich, Newcastle, ... such a long list. Our third largest membership by country is Canada, with most of our members residing in Vancouver and Toronto.

You should check out our new forums in our message board - tied to regions in a country. We may have gone overboard for the UK - we created 12. For Canada, we made 6. Naturally, Texas is considered its own region... Why is it that everything in Texas is big?

Dallas has a rowing club that is getting huge. They are or have moved to a new boathouse on a new lake and have boats galore. Their next learn to row class is in September: http://www.dallasrowingclub.org/cms/index.php?page=lear_to_row

We purposely structured GLRF to be an individual membership organization that respects each person's preference for their respective rowing club. So no, there aren't that many gay rowing clubs worldwide but there are soooooooo many gay and lesbian rowers out there, happily rowing. We just added our first member from Mexico, bringing our worldwide membership to 27 countries.

Yep, we welcome all members of the rowing community, rowers, coxies, coaches, and race officials.

through rowing, I've met a diverse cohort of people. The main event, the Head of the Charles, was a regatta in which I had the pleasure of interacting with some of the finest crews in the world and there surely were men from the U.K. present and walking the hell away from many a u.s. crew as well. it was maddeningly exciting.

I was stroke in my boat in college at Sewanee, TN. But now I'm back home in El Paso ... middle of the Chihuahuan Desert. Not much rowing around here :-/

Living in the desert, there is no rowing community here. But I still do my 10000 kilometers on the erg every week. I want to stay in shape in case I move to a rowing city again.

I just found out 48 hours ago that I will be going to the Head of the Charles for the first time ever. I'm excited and terrified.

I rowed for a year and a half in undergrad, and Vassar being an extremely liberal and gay-friendly school with a very large gay population (both male and female) there were a lot of gay guys and girls on the team. It was a really good experience for me because I got first-hand experience at seeing that gay guys and lesbians really don't have to fit into the molds that you see on TV since before that I had never encountered openly gay guys on a sports team before.

I rowed at the Head of the Charles back in 2001. It was a great experience.

[quote][cite]Rowing_Ant said[/cite]LOL

Well rowing is just full of homo-erotic terminology

Cox
Stroke
Shaft
Hard Finishes.

etc etc etc.

[/quote

Don't forget "catching crabs" lol. I just started rowing with a gay rowing organization in Chicago in the spring. Hard as hell, but I love it especially sitting stroke.

dannyboy1101 said
Don't forget "catching crabs" lol. I just started rowing with a gay rowing organization in Chicago in the spring. Hard as hell, but I love it especially sitting stroke.

Catching crabs is not fun. I still have a scar from one that I caught during a power 10... four years ago.

skifan08 said

dannyboy1101 said
Don't forget "catching crabs" lol. I just started rowing with a gay rowing organization in Chicago in the spring. Hard as hell, but I love it especially sitting stroke.

Catching crabs is not fun. I still have a scar from one that I caught during a power 10... four years ago.

No kidding ... I got smacked in the back by the 7 seat's oar. He was recovering from catching a crab as i was at the release ... not fun.

TheIStrat saidI just found out 48 hours ago that I will be going to the Head of the Charles for the first time ever. I'm excited and terrified.

dude! I'm in Boston now for school! let me know when you're here ... and if you're participating ... I would def. cheer for ya'. either way, good luck.

kizzle11 said

No kidding ... I got smacked in the back by the 7 seat's oar. He was recovering from catching a crab as i was at the release ... not fun.

Ouch!

crunchit saidLiving in the desert, there is no rowing community here. But I still do my 10000 kilometers on the erg every week. I want to stay in shape in case I move to a rowing city again.

ten thousand kilometres a week? I hope that's a typo!

let's try meters !

I'm doing p90x right now. I won't start up on the erg again until I'm sure I'll be moving to a place where I can start rowing again, lol.

Hey guys:

GLRF just launched our new internal social network, called Network Now! which provides for unlimited groups.

Already, we have started or groups have launched for

Austin http://rowteamaustin.glrf.info
New York City http://crewnewyork.glrf.info
London http://thenewrowmantics.glrf.info
London http://londonwomen.glrf.info
Los Angeles http://whoars.glrf.info

We started a juniors group for Sydney, Australia:

http://nswhardcoars.glrf.info

We started a college group for rowers in Ontario, Canada:

http://ontariounis.glrf.info

You could even start a group for a regatta, like the Head of the Charles. We'll be there hosting a GLRF booth.

Cheers,
Brian