Seniors serious about high expectations

The women's rowing team has set their sights high for this season. They are expecting to compete for the Big Ten championship in May and they are also expecting to receive a bid to the NCAA Championships. These are lofty expectations for a team that is just in its fourth year of being a varsity sport.\nBolstering those expectations is a group of six seniors, Danielle Bird, Margarete Clark, Becky England, Erin Koers, Stephanie Mast, and Emily Rumschlag. Together, the seniors said they are working harder than ever to reach their goals.\nWhen this group of seniors first came to IU, only one of them, Clark, had rowed in high school. The rest of them were trying a new sport and none knew what to expect.\nEngland, the captain, is a coxswain for the varsity team.\n"When I first came here, everybody was really nice," she said. "None of us really knew what to expect. When we first rowed together, we thought it was great even though we were terrible. We seemed to work really well together."\nBird remembers her first day at practice.\n"I remember seeing Margarete and then the coach told me that he wanted me to look like that," Bird said. "I was a little intimidated because she's so tall (5-10) and I thought, 'That's what rowers are supposed to look like?' None of us rowed in high school besides Margarete, but now we know what we have to get done."\nBoth England and Bird said they are ready to lead the team and help teach the freshmen the ins and outs of rowing.\n"We're going to show them that you don't need one person in control," England said. "They just need to respect each other and watch us varsity rowers to see how things are done." \nBird agreed and added it's important for the seniors to be supportive of their freshmen teammates.\n"When we first got here, the older girls treated us terrible. We are going to help these freshmen out, but we aren't exactly going to take them under our wing," Bird said. "We just want to make them feel like a part of the team."\nThe Hoosiers have been working hard to be prepared for the season. Their practices are held at Lake Lemon and last from six until eight in the morning. In addition to on-the-water time, they also endure rigorous weight lifting sessions everyday.\nKoers believes the intense focus they place on practice will help them on race day.\n"We've been working in small boats that are sensitive to every movement in order to tweak our technique and to work with various combinations of rowers," Koers said in a statement. "We've been lifting and focusing on core exercises to help maintain endurance throughout the race. Mentally, we all know how much work we've put in physically -- so when we're in the middle of our race, and beginning to fatigue, we can recall how much we've worked for this and pull harder."\nEngland said the seniors decided to do something special to prepare for this season.\n"Before classes started this year, the six of us got together and sat down and made a list of our goals and things we wanted to do and achieve," England said. "We just want to help the team move forward in the future"