Rowing brings recognition to Grand Island teen

by Alice E. Gerard
Grand Island Dispatch, July 14, 2006

James Thompson

At a time of day when many people are rubbing their eyes and starting to make their coffee, James Thompson is already in a boat with his teammates, practicing maneuvers for the next regatta.

Practicing at 6 a.m. does not bother the 17-year-old Grand Islander, who just completed his junior year at Canisius High School.

“I like practicing in the morning a lot better because the water is calmer and it’s a lot easier to get things done,” he said, adding that during the winter months, the team prepares for the spring regatta season by practicing on the school’s rowing machines.

All of that preparation paid off for the Canisius crew team. Coached by Jim Neil, a 1986 Canisius High School graduate and a member of the U.S. National Rowing team from 1989 through 2000, the school has had boats finish in the top three in a number of regattas this season, including a first-place finish in the New York State Championships in Saratoga Springs; a third-place finish in the Scholastic Rowing National Championships, also in Saratoga Springs; a second-place finish in the South Niagara Invitational Regatta in Welland, Ontario; and a first-place finish in USRowing National Youth Championships in Cincinnati, Ohio.

Thompson, the only Grand Island resident in his nine-man boat (eight rowers and one coxswain), described the dramatic finish of his boat, the lightweight eight, in the USRowing National Youth Championships.

“At the start of the race, St. Joseph’s Preparatory School (of Philadelphia), the perennial powerhouse, was beating us by several seconds, but halfway through the race, we were able to make up much of that distance and for the rest of the race, we were losing to them by only one second,” he said. “With 200 meters left in the race, we sprinted for the finish line and, at the very end, we beat St. Joe’s Prep by .09 seconds. Immediately after the race finished, neither team knew who won. We got out of the water, and we brought our boat back to the trailer when, finally, one of the officials called my coach and told him that we won.”

Beating the school that had won that championship for five out of the last seven years “was very exciting,” Thompson said.

Thompson said being able to race as a lightweight made him more competitive, but staying below a weight limit, which can vary from regatta to regatta, can be challenging. The weight limit at Saratoga Springs was 150 pounds, and the weight limit at Cincinnati was 155 pounds. Thompson, at 5 feet 10 inches,

“It can be hard to maintain a 150 pound limit,” the 5-foot-10-inch Thompson said. “It does involve discipline in my diet. In the winter, I was 165 pounds, and my coach told me that he wanted me to row as a lightweight. That involved a lot of discipline because I had to lose 15 pounds in two and a half months.

“In the heavyweight category, there is no weight limit. I could have raced against someone who weighs 225 pounds. That would have been very tough, and I would not have won as many races.”

In addition to being an athlete, Thompson is an honor student. This requires a good deal of organization, he said.

“Like any other sport, rowing takes about two hours a day, so there is a higher level of time management involved than for someone who doesn’t do a sport,” he said. “When I get home, I don’t do much else except eat dinner and do homework, which averages four hours per night.”

Now that the school year is over, Thompson rows for the West Side Rowing Club, where he participated in rowing for the first time during the summer before he entered high school. He said that he always enjoyed boating, especially canoeing and kayaking.

While an eighth grader at the Nardin Academy Elementary School, “a friend who was three years older than I, who rowed at Canisius, invited me to watch a regatta,” Thompson said. “I decided that I liked it and that I wanted to join the crew team when I got into high school.

“During the summer of 2003, I signed up for the crew camp at the West Side Rowing Club, and I learned how to row. It was very fun and enjoyable. After crew camp was done and I entered high school, I joined the novice crew team, and I’ve been rowing ever since at school.”

Thompson, who also works as a lifeguard at Martin’s Fantasy Island during the summer, hopes to attend an Ivy League college after graduating from high school. He would like to major in either biology or chemistry and compete with the college crew team.

If younger children were to ask him if they should consider rowing, he said he would tell them to “keep an open mind because rowing doesn’t have the popularity of football, baseball, and basketball. I would encourage them to watch a regatta and get a feel for the environment and also to join the crew camp program at the West Side Rowing Club during the summer.”