The K-State Wildcats women’s rowing team heads to Lawrence this Sunday for the Jayhawk Jamboree, the team’s second and last regatta this fall season.
The Wildcats only other regatta was two weeks ago at the Head of the Oklahoma in Oklahoma City, Okla., where K-State put four boats in the top 10 of various races.
Other squads that will be racing at Burcham Park in Lawrence include the Kansas Jayhawks, the hosts for the event, as well as the Wichita State Shockers, Tulsa Golden Hurricane and Drake Bulldogs.
K-State head coach Patrick Sweeney that he is happy with where his relatively young squad is at heading into the Jamboree.
“I’m really pleased with where they are right now,” Sweeney said. “We have a really young team right now. But where they’re at right now, they’re looking pretty good.”
While the Wildcats want to have success at the regatta, Sweeney says that the fall events are more like extended practices for the spring season, which is the main time of year for competition rowing in the NCAA.
“Especially at this time of year, this is an extended training session,” Sweeney said. “It’s a more intense training session and gives us a chance to see where people are at, see them under pressure and how they handle things.”
At practice this week, wind and cold weather made it difficult for the Wildcats to go onto open water at Tuttle Creek Lake and get full practices in. So Sweeney had his team work on a lot of technical work this week, which he says is crucial in the early goings of the season.
“It’s like anything, when you’re preparing you’re not killing yourself,” Sweeney said. “If you’re making technical mistakes, you’re just killing yourself. So we want to get rid of the bad technique.”
After this last fall regatta, the Wildcats don’t return to action until March 22, 2014 when they travel to Austin, Texas for the Longhorn Invitational.