If by chance you were to walk by the Chicago river during the week, you may happen to see OPRF Senior Maria Kent and her teammates practicing their rowing.

Since her freshman year Kent has been apart of the Chicago Rowing Foundation, a competitive rowing team made of high school students from all over the Chicagoland area.

Everyday after school, Kent makes the trip to the city to go to practice.“We practice from 4:30 to 6, Monday through Friday, and then from 7 to 9 on Saturday mornings,” said Kent. “I do what’s called sweeping which means that every rower has one oar, and it either goes out on the right side or the left side of the boat… I row in what is called eights, which means that there are eight rowers. There are four people with starboard (right side) oars and four people on the port (left side) oars.”

As a competitive rower one must spend their first year on the Novice team which is for beginners, after the first year there is an opportunity to compete to row on one of the varsity boats.

During her novice year, and her past two seasons on the team’s top varsity boat, Kent has been able to find a lot success with her team since freshman year. “We have taken second at regionals every year I have been on varsity (the past two years) but we won our novice year,” said Kent. “Most recently at Nationals we competed at Mercer Lake we took 6th, the year before that we took 5th. We are hoping to absolutely make it to nationals again.”

Kent’s rowing team also competes in other competitions throughout the year. “We travel a lot for our regattas (rowing competitions) because the midwest is not a huge rowing site. Spring is our main season but we’ll travel a little bit for fall as well,” said Kent. “We recently competed at the “Head of the Rock” (Regatta) at the Rock River in Rockford, in the first weekend of November we will travel down to Chattanooga Tennessee for a big race.”

Next year Kent will attend Stanford University on a Division 1 Rowing scholarship. Her recruitment started during her junior year. “It’s basically three numbers (recruiting schools look at) your GPA, your ACT or SAT, and then your personalized 2000 meter score.” To determine the 2000 meter score, rowers use an ergometer, an artificial rowing device, to determine their time. “My 2000 meter is a 7:16, for my age group amongst those who would have gone to a national tournament I would have place 8th in the nation,” said Kent.

“I would say Maria is a good friend and teammate. She is very supportive and always willing to help” said Kent’s teammate Tessa Otting. “She has a good work ethic and is willing to do whatever it takes to get the job done. She definitely has a role as leader on our team.”

For Kent, Rowing is more than just a sport. “Rowing teaches kids the characteristics like dedication, self-confidence, and setting long term goals,” said Kent. “I’ve learned so much about myself.. I’ve gotten to learn truly how much I are capable of.”