The Alabama rowing team continued their strong start to the season by sweeping SMU in 12 races this morning. 

The First and Second Varsity 8+ and the First and Second Varsity 4+ competed in four 2,000-meter races and eight 1,000-meter races. 

The fastest time of the day was 7:32 in the 2,000-meter races and 3:51 in the 1,000-meter race. Both times belonged to UA’s “Battleship” boat. 

The four 2,000 meter races marked the longest races for Alabama so far this season. The rowers were up for the challenge of the longer distances and won each by 6 seconds or more. 

“Last week we had a strong showing, but we knew there were some technical things we had to work on,” senior Nicole Lane said. “Moving from a 1,000 meter race to a 2,000 meter race you have to have more endurance and strength and so we worked on maximizing our efficiency so that we could still power through the longer race.” 

Head coach Larry Davis saw many improvements from last week to this week which made him very happy. 

“What I saw this weekend as opposed to last weekend was whatever lineup we put was that girls were getting after it,” Davis said. “We were being aggressive and doing the little things right.”

Davis used different lineups for some of the boats to shake things up and based on the results it did not bother the team at all. 

“The Varsity 8+ boats had the same lineups for the most part, but in the 4+ boats we had to start from scratch,” senior Claire Estep said. “In the beginning of the week we had to get over having a brand new lineup and settle in and by the end of the week we were ready to race.” 

The next regatta for Alabama will not be until Mar. 24 at the Crimson Tide Invitational against Jacksonville, Dayton, and Creighton.