Indoor Racing Season Starts with Good Showing in Indianapolis

Four athletes from Illinois traveled to Indianapolis for the 2013 Indianapolis Indoor Rowing Championship. The day started well with Senior Danielle Saubert finishing 4th in the Women's Open event, finishing behind former US National Team rower Jen Kaido, current Junior National Team rower Amanda Elmore of Purdue University, and the top rower from IU who was rowing as an independent. While Dani's time of 7:05.0 was 5 seconds off her personal record, it was good enough to beat out the rest of the 29 athlete field, including 14 D1 athletes rowing as independents. Nick Van Antwerp and Ben Wilson both beat the previous Illinois Men's record (which was held by Nick) to claim 4th and 5th respectively behind three rowers from Purdue who were able to perform a clean sweep of the Varsity Men's race. Novice rower Erika Ball finished 8th behind 6 D1 rowers rowing as independents and the top Novice Woman from Purdue. Erika's time of 8:01.0 is a season record.The day concluded with an exciting relay race. The 2000m relay race requires 4 athletes (2 men, 2 women) to switch off every 500m. Athletes must transfer quickly as transition times are included in the total time. Novice Erika Ball lead off the race, while many teams - rival Purdue included - opted to lead with a Varsity Men's Athlete. After the first transition, Purdue lead by 108m. Senior Danielle Saubert was able to make up ground on Purdue rower Amanda Elmore whom she raced in the Open Women's category. Varsity Rower Benjamin Wilson took over for the third leg of the relay, and was able to make up an impressive 75m to pull Illinois to within 12 meters by the final transition. Nick Van Antwerp was able to pull to within 9m of Purdue's Michael Frick; Frick's lead however managed the fastest 500m leg of the day to pull back out to a 14m lead and a 3 second victory for Purdue over Illinois. Both Illinois and Purdue broke the previous event record (previously 6:05 held by Purdue) - Purdue's new record stands at 6:01. Illinois finished well ahead of the rest of the 14 team field.For full results, you can find them at row2k.com.