Club Profile/ Jun 10

Getting to Know the St. Lawrence Rowing Club

To honour the history, dedication and current initiatives of each rowing community, Row Ontario will be producing a series of profiles on member clubs across Ontario. Today we get to know more about the St. Lawrence Rowing Club!

St. Lawrence Rowing Club
Established: 2006
Location: Iroquois, Ont.
www.stlawrencerowing.com

A fun and friendly recreational rowing club located in Iroquois, Ont., the St. Lawrence Rowing Club rows on a beautiful stretch of water on the Galop Canal.

The Galop Canal runs alongside the St. Lawrence River and is a very calm and quiet stretch of water, unlike the St. Lawrence River which can be very fast moving. The club’s waterway stretches about 8km between Iroquois and Cardinal, Ont., and also has limited boat traffic, leading to calm waters for the clubs’ rowers.

Members of the club have been rowing on the Galop Canal waters since 2006, when the SLRC was established by Trish Morrow, a former varsity rower at Trent University who had moved to nearby Morrisburg, Ont., and decided to start up a rowing club in the area. During the first year in operation the club had a few members including some teens from the local high school. The second year, the SLRC ran its first learn to row program and began introducing the sport to more adults in the local area.

“We’re a very small club and we maintain a core group of 15-20 people each year who either rowed in high school or in college or university, as well as some who took our learn to row program and have stayed on,” said Nancy Jordan, the St. Lawrence Rowing Club’s President and Head Coach. “We usually run one learn to row per year in the spring with around ten people, many of which usually stay on for the summer that year. We usually put a few of our core group of recreational rowers in the boats along with the new rowers. They just set up the boat better and having some rowers in the boat with some experience really helps the new rowers feel more comfortable.”

Following the learn to row sessions, the club’s adult recreational season starts up and continues for the rest of the summer. The club’s members meet anywhere from 2-5 times per week and row in singles, doubles, fours and eights. The primary goals of the adult recreational season are for the club’s members to enjoy the water, gain some fitness and improve on their rowing skills in a low-pressure environment.

The club’s members typically come from within 30km of Iroquois, with members coming from neighbouring communities such as Ingleside, Winchester, South Mountain, and Brockville to row on the Galop Canal. The club sets up their dock in a commercial marina in May and usually rows until the beginning of October when the colder temperatures start coming in.

As President and head coach, Jordan spearheads the coaching and organizational aspects of the SLRC, but the club’s core members are always willing to lend a hand with any tasks that need to be accomplished.

“Our core group of members come back every year and help out which is great,” said Jordan. “If we have a project that needs a few hands-on deck, I usually organize the workers or if we have any club meetings that they always show up and do any work that needs to be done. It’s great to have that type of help.”