California Lightweight Women’s Rowing
2005 Fall Season Highlights

Dear Team and Alumni:

Varsity
The fall race season got into full swing with the varsity traveling east to race in the annual fall classic, the head of The Charles Regatta. This year the Bears raced in the Lightweight Four event; a highly competitive field that included all the top teams from the U.S. and Canada. Cruising down the course at 31-32 spm the bears passed 4 teams and finished an impressive 8th place.

Next up for the team was the Head of the American in Sacramento. Again racing in the four, the girls raced in the openweight race. Racing at a comfortable 31spm, in a field that only had 8 boats, they crossed the finish line in 3rd place. The Varsity’s final fall race was at the annual fall
Newport Regatta. With no Lightweight 4 event, the team again raced in the open weight four event. The team put in another solid performance racing tough teams from L.A. and San Diego. The four finished in 7th place with 14 boats racing.

The goal this spring for the eight will be to make the finals this time at the Crew Classic. Also, the focus will be on winning the lightweight 8 event at WIRA’s. As for the four, the focus will be to win the Varsity Lightweight 4 event for the first time at WIRA’s. If the four has a successful race season, the team will travel to Philly to race at the Dad Vail Regatta.

Novice
The novice team also had an impressive fall season. With the varsity girls doing an impressive job with recruiting walk-ons at Caltopia and Callapoloza, Coach Linden had her hands full with 3 eights worth of rowers. Helping Coach Linden this year is first year coach Liz Pattersen from UC Davis.

The novice team started the fall season at the Head of the American racing two boats in the novice open 8 event and one boat in the Varsity Lightweight 8 race. In the novice race the “a” boat raced very aggressively against the open weight novice teams to finish in 5th place. The novice “B” boat also had a solid first race to take the 9th place out of 12 crews. In the Lightweight 8 race the girls raced more experienced crews and took 5th place.

Next up for the novice team was the annual fall regatta down in Newport. In a grueling race the novice 8 finished a respectful 16th place and the novice lightweight eight finished 5th.

The novice’s final fall race was at the annual BIAC Regatta. This time the novice raced in the novice 8 and open 8 event. With only a few entries in both races, the Bears finished the fall season in grand style and took first place in both events

We would like to thank all the Alumni, “Friends of” and Supporters of California Lightweight crew. Without your support and dedication we could not make this season happen.

GO BEARS!

Rich Wendling
Women’s Coach
Cal Lightweight Crew