 
When I started rowing in Florida — in Jacksonville and then in Tallahassee — strangers would approach me at regattas to inquire whether it was my son or daughter who was competing. Today, as I maneuver my Chevy Prizm around the hills of rural Tennessee on my way to Oak Ridge from Roswell, Georgia, under a boat twice the length of the car, no one gives me a second look. I’ve come to the right place. I’m on my way to Oak Ridge’s Secret City Head Race to compete in my single scull. I’m more accustomed to the frenetic energy of Northern, urban regattas, such as the marquee races in Philadelphia or Boston, where American rowing began, or even the rowing scene in Europe, imbued as it is with old-world privilege or state-sanctioned legitimacy. Oak Ridge, tucked into the corduroy-like ridges and valleys of the southern Appalachians, twenty-five miles west of Knoxville, resembles neither. Plain, sturdy homes organized in regular, almost grid-like precision give no hint that the town would support something as unapologetically fun as rowing. Yet, this improbable exemplar of rowing venues has co-opted the sport, transformed it, and made it part of the rural Southern landscape — against all odds. The area was isolated and virtually uninhabited until World War II, when the Manhattan Engineer District, the early phase of the Manhattan Project, went shopping for a place to produce fuel for the world’s first nuclear weapon. The lack of development — not to mention the abundance of calm water courtesy of the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) —– was just what the Army loved about the place. About twenty years after the war’s end, the federal government dammed the Clinch River and created Melton Hill Lake, just east of town. The lake wasn’t designed for rowing but could have been — flat water protected by hills on both sides, and plenty of it — and it immediately provided the next generation of immigrants a way to import the tradition of rowing, born of London ferrymen competing against one another on the river Thames. Rowing had already conquered the Northeast, and even traveled to the West Coast, but never really caught fire in the South. Crew might have remained an oddity in the South if not for a 1972 federal law meant to expand collegiate athletics for women. College administrators quickly figured out that rowing was an effective way to satisfy the mandate of the law, and as a result, varsity-level women athletes have been sitting down and going backwards at Howard’s old lair since 1998. And the 2008 U.S. Olympic rowing team is completing its cold-weather training at Clemson’s brand-new 11,500-square-foot boathouse on South Carolina’s Lake Hartwell. In the Zone I was living in Jacksonville, in 1993, when I knew I had to give rowing a try. The St. Johns River — in reality, a huge, protected bay — is home to scores of rowers who, every day during my commute, made the sport look enticingly graceful and deceptively easy. And, of course, they betrayed me. I had envisioned a glissade under the hazy Florida sun as I communed with the herons standing sentinel on the shore. In reality, the initial forays in a rowing scull feel like the first few moments of learning how to ride a bicycle, so my first few rowing lessons challenged my confidence and tested my resolve. But since then I’ve rowed all over the South, fighting the choppy waters around Chattanooga and looking out for gators at the incomparable Newnans Lake in Gainesville. My quest is that in-the-zone sensation rowers call “swing” — the feeling, attained when the stroke is executed perfectly, that I am jetting along friction-free just above the water. There’s a bumper sticker that sums it up perfectly: “Rowing: Life at top speed in perfect balance.” For a rower in quest of that perfect row, Melton Hill Lake has everything, and to top that off, in the past seven years the Oak Ridge Rowing Association (ORRA) has added about $1 million in improvements. The payoff has been great. USRowing named Oak Ridge the 2005 Club of the Year, and in 2007 tapped member Allen Eubanks as Coach of the Year. Also in 2007, an Oak Ridge newspaper reported that seven regattas in the early part of the year generated $58 million for the local economy. Rowing here is more than a diversion: It’s an economic engine. I’ve come to associate Southern regattas with a relaxed, easygoing manner, but even by those standards registration at Oak Ridge today is an informal process.My name is added at the last minute, and the volunteer at registration doesn’t even bother to ask my age, so I assume she won’t bother to handicap my finishing time. In seconds I’m out the door with a bow number and a “Good luck” from the regatta staff, in search of food. Southern rowing venues are geographically dispersed, so athletes at regattas are likely to stay over at least one night (envision a rowing version of a hallowed football institution, an indolent, two-day tailgate party at water’s edge). So, while the food at Northern regattas mostly consists of obligatory carbs, Southern regattas pay a bit more attention to the fare. Once, the Head of the South regatta near Augusta, Georgia, offered a Lowcountry boil that my friends and I dream of still. Today’s race at Oak Ridge isn’t big enough for such an extravaganza, but for a $5 donation to the youth rowing program I can load a plate with sandwiches, salads, drinks, and desserts from the crew parents’ tent. As my race time approaches, I launch my boat near the finish line and begin the three-and-a-half-mile row to the start of the race. Armed with a promise from chief referee Ray Duff of “lots of stuff to see out there,” I’m ready for sightseeing along the mostly rural course. Then, the race begins. “And you’re on,” intones the starting referee. For the next two thousand meters or so I learn why Oak Ridge is so proud of this course. The river, wide and flat, gives way on both banks to an expanse that could be a floodplain if the TVA ever allowed such a thing. And after spending much of the regatta on shore and near the docks, which is like being backstage at a high school play, I’m grateful for the calm to focus on the essentials: me, my boat, and a point toward the finish line. The sprays of the cool water, pulled from the bottom of the Norris Dam, are refreshing on this hot day. Joke if you must about the water’s nuclear glow: In 2006 the TVA rated the ecological health of the Melton Hill Reservoir as “good,” and state officials have given the reservoir the go-ahead for swimming. Much as I love the urban feel of the rivers in Boston and Philadelphia, I’m disinclined to allow the water near a paper cut. In the last one thousand meters, private land gives way to the park itself, and spectators have a clear line of sight from grassy, tree-lined banks. The crowd cheers, even for an unknown late entry from out of town. Finally, the finish. Oak Ridge not only has great rowing water — it also has a lot of it: The course is an excruciating 3.4 miles long. If there is a longer head race in modern rowing, no one has been able to identify it for me. As I paddle gamely back to the dock, I find some comfort in the fact that I kept my nearest competitor in sight and didn’t lose too much ground. As I pass onlookers at the finish tower, the race official waves and I respond with a nod. “What’s your handicap?” she yells from about thirty feet away. Officials have noticed that I didn’t provide my age during registration, and they need it to calculate a handicap. Though I instantly understand the question, I play for time and stare blankly back at her, quickly calculating the cost I will have to pay to later satisfy my curiosity about my performance. Finally, I shout back, “Fifty.” The end of most races — even for the winners — is desultory. With one last surge of energy, exhausted athletes swing boats overhead to tote them back to a trailer. Then, a zealous volunteer chases the rowers off the dock to make room for the next team. Today at Oak Ridge, though, the volunteers give me my choice of dock and all the time I need. And I know Betsy Spooner might be on shore waiting for me. At a regatta some years ago the longtime Oak Ridge rowing aide-de-camp ached for race volunteer officials camped out all day in the hot sun. So, on the second day she arrived armed with plastic bags of washcloths, frozen and infused with extract of mint. Ever since, the washcloths have become a ceremonial tradition, and on this day, though I am not an official, Spooner deems me worthy, and I am transported. About a month after the Secret City Head Race, some fact-checking sends me to the ORRA Web page. Curiosity wins out, and I check the final adjusted race times. My age handicap has pushed me into third place and a bronze medal. That’s more than enough for me. |
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