New Jersey rowing club places third, receives honors at competition
NEW JERSEY (WABC) -- A group of young athletes from the Tri-State area earned international honors this past October at the largest three-day rowing competition in the world.
The group from the Nereid Boat Club finished third in the Women's Under 17 at the Head of the Charles Regatta competition in Massachusetts.
"It was so surreal to be able to bring back this chip from the race," said Sarah Newman, one of the rowers.
Newman's teammate, Maeve Bogue, also agreed.
"It's definitely cool being able to come back and be like, all the training we put in and all the work we put in, the stressful practices, the bad practices and the good practices -- everything was all worth it," Bogue said.
Everything they went through entailed much more than just facing the 25 other boats in the competition. These teens, all from New Jersey, were only together for a few weeks before the race.
"The lineup -- the coach was switching girls in and out for different positions, and it was just like this puzzle," said Ella Gill, another teammate.
Despite the changes, Newman says the team immediately found their footing together.
"I feel like two weeks before we kind of just clicked, and we're like this is what we're going to do, and we're going to do great," Newman said.
During the competition, the group faced some adversity when 15-year-old Elliot Bullis, the youngest member of the team and the coxswain, had a microphone malfunction at the start. Bullis had to do a lot of yelling in order to communicate with her teammates.
"So I have the mic, and it's like steering, making sure my boat can hear me," Bullis said.
"It was just screaming, and it was hard to concentrate, but I am so beyond proud of us for getting third."
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