..history..

how we were founded
Michael May
Original Team Founder
First Team President

I was a coop in Huntsville working for the US Army and met some students at UAH (University of Alabama at Huntsville) who introduced me to rowing. Upon my return to GT for my last year and a half (I took 5 and a half years to graduate), I decided I wanted to try rowing - I had no eligibility left for Track or Cross Country Running. It was early 85 Winter term, and when I returned from co-op I realized there wasn't a program at Tech.  I looked around and Emory University had a Crew Club.  I went over there and they introduced me to rowing at the Atlanta Rowing Club. 

From there I convinced my roommate at Tech, Mark Turner - also a cross country runner and track member, to row a pair with me and we started training at the ARC. This is how the McKenna's first got involved, we met Debbie and Jeff at the Rowing Club and became friends with them. I also started coaching a high school girls 4 and coxing them. 

Anyway, from there we rowed most of the spring and summer for ARC in the pair and did pretty well.  During the late summer of 85, I decided, I believe because other students at Tech were getting interested, to start an organization and get sanctioned by the school as a club sport. We eventually got officially recognized by the school in Spring 1986 and received money from the Georgia Tech Student Foundation.  From there we bought some oars and a Pocock 8 from a school out west. 

I remember that it took us a while to find enough people to fill boats and the first season we only had a women's 4 and a men's 4.  Mark and I didn't row in either boat; we were still working on the pair. Both of us are very small guys and we worked well together, but the guys we had interested in the four were bigger and they worked out as part of the barbell club if I remember right. 

It was a trial the first year getting money, although SGA did come through for us in the end.  Nowadays, though and even to a lesser extent then, it was about money.  Money basically meant being able to get a competitive shell.  After I left, I think this is where Debbie had the largest impact. So, we started operating the club and more and more people got interested.  I graduated in December of '86 and moved to Florida.  Mark stayed and got a Masters till the following spring and then moved to Florida in August of 87.  We bought a great lightweight Vespoli pair and raced for another two years, but it is real hard to keep it up and to coordinate all of the work schedules. We sold our Vespoli a couple of years later to guess who, but Debbie McKenna (Permenter), who at that time I believe was the first official coach of the GT team.  I still follow the events and have supported the effort from afar.  Its funny looking back on it now, but starting the rowing club is an accomplishment that I take a lot of pride in.

This was a brief e-mail written to Slim going over how Michael started the ball rolling for rowing at GaTech.