With the weather brightening up, the men’s heavyweight and lightweight rowing teams are all set to have their first races next week at Ithaca College next Saturday, March 27th. The heavyweight team will compete in the I.C. Round Robin, starting at 8:30 a.m., and the lightweight team will be in the I.C. Invitational at 9:00 a.m.

Both teams come off of a very successful season in the fall, but recognized that there was work to be done this winter. Although the Cornell boats finished well in the varsity 4+ —     placing second through fourth at the Syracuse Fall Invitational — Syracuse took first by a large margin. As a result, the teams dedicated themselves to practicing harder, and decided to take part in a training session in Florida over winter break. Most of them will stay over the break to keep training. The athletes are anxious to show the results of their work in the first race of the season.

“We learned some important lessons this fall and especially during this winter’s training season,” said junior lightweight captain Matt Rung. “We’ve prepared through a lot of hard work and sacrifice.”

Senior heavyweight captain Chris Frendl also acknowledged the team’s intense workouts over break when discussing improvements the team had made going in to the new season.Row your boat: The men’s rowing team takes on Ithaca in its first meet of the new season. - By: Tina Chou

“We’re looking great. … We’ve trained hard this winter, especially with the week in Florida,” he said. “We want to improve our record and … do better than last season. We need to work on getting our boats to move quicker.”

In terms of specific goals laid out for the lightweight team, the goal was simple.

“Win,” Rung said. “There are incremental goals that one can aspire to along the way involving technical changes and physiological boundaries, but it’s all aimed at the same thing.”

In Ithaca both teams are expected to compete in multiple races throughout the day, and the proximity to home has the lightweight team feeling especially comforted about having the ability to play in such familiar surroundings.

“Each race has its own feel,” Rung said. “The Ithaca invitational, for example, is on our home course. It takes away distractions and allows us to focus in on the race.”

“It should be fun. It’s the first race of the season and that’s always exciting,” Frendl said.