USRowing Spotlight: Mary Whipple

A two-time Olympian and eight-time national team member, Mary Whipple coxed the U.S. women's eight to a gold medal in Beijing last year - and hasn't slowed down since. With the recent release of her coaching website, the 9th Seat, she continues to give back to the sport of rowing, one coxswain at a time.

USROWING: You grew up in Sacramento, just a few miles from Lake Natoma. How did you discover the sport of rowing and first get into coxing?

WHIPPLE: Every spring we would notice all the rowing shells down at the lake and also around at certain restaurants such as Spaghetti Factory or Fresh Choice. The summer before our freshman year of high school, my mom suggested that my sister and I take a learn-to-row class at the CSUS Aquatic Center at Lake Natoma. We did, and the rowing coach for the Capital Crew junior program saw us and our size and invited us to go out for the novice team in October. I don't know why we remembered, but a couple of months later October came and my sister and I went down to the aquatic center to give rowing a try. We got to actually row in the beginning, because there was a barge for the novices. However, as soon as we graduated away from the barge and into eights, the coxswain seat became home.

USROWING: You and your twin sister, Sarah, coxed your respective crews to national titles at the 2002 NCAA Championships. What was it like growing up with a twin sister who was also involved in the sport of rowing?

WHIPPLE: I loved coxing with my sister. We worked very well together and trusted each other's steering, and it was good to talk to someone on the way home after practice that knew about the sport and knew what to say after we vented to each other. We were never into playing tricks on our rowers, but our freshman year of college, we both were on the water practicing for the San Diego Crew Classic and pulled up to the course at the same time. Our rowers thought it was very weird to hear someone else sound the same from another boat. It was fun to follow each other's races and our rowers in our boats senior year cheered for each other throughout the season because our teams were having a very good and fast year. Our boats won the Crew Classic and the NCAA Championships that year, and we have some good group shots together.

USROWING: As an eight-time senior national team member, you've collected more than a dozen medals in international competition, including silver in Athens and gold in Beijing. If you had to pick just one, what is the single most memorable experience in your coxing career?

WHIPPLE: That is a hard question because it is like having a parent decide what child they love the most. Each race and team is special to me for certain reasons. With that said, I'd be crazy not to say Beijing has changed my life and will be the most memorable race. Each year, races and team members enable me to have that memorable experience, and I wouldn't have arrived at the finish line of Beijing without all the experiences that I've gotten to share with my teammates over the past eight years on the national team.

USROWING: You once described your coxing style in the boat as "cool under pressure, calm and relentless." What is your secret to staying focused under the most stressful of racing situations?

WHIPPLE: I think my secret to staying focused under the stress of racing is the fact that my teammates are depending on me in the same way that I am depending on them to execute the race plan. The race plan is very important to nail on race day and it is my job to deliver the race plan and to enable the rowers to execute the race plan. I know if we nail our execution on race day, then winning will take care of itself. In Beijing, we nailed it.

USROWING: Tell me about The 9th Seat. What sparked the idea to start your own one-on-one coaching program?

WHIPPLE: There aren't a lot of resources for coxswains to receive coaching. Most learn with the trial-by-fire method or never learn and just get thrown in there because a boat needs a coxswain to get down the race course. I've done clinics in the past, and coxswains have always come up afterwards, wanting me to give them feedback to their audio. With The 9th Seat, coxswains can submit audio and have one-on-one conversations of how to better organize their phrases and their race plan. Coxswains can also learn from other coxswains because I'm going to make sure to blog a lot of my answers to common questions. In the future, I'm also going to have podcasts and interview other coxswains, so that others can learn what has worked for different boats and races. I also just bought a flip camera and I'm going to try and post short video interviews and highlight some coxswains who have been successful at all levels of this sport. I'm excited about www.9thseat.com because I want to make it a valuable coxing resource with useful information.

USROWING: What's been the most challenging and/or rewarding aspect of coaching so far?

WHIPPLE: The most challenging part of coaching is thinking that you've explained what needs to be changed or executed and then not knowing if your athlete will actually execute what you tried to communicate to them. I've done clinics where there were a lot of coxswains nodding their heads, but then when we would go out on the water to practice what they learned, it seemed like they didn't really listen. That is why I really like giving a clinic where there is a lecture portion and a water session right afterwards, so I can make sure that the coxswains are really executing and learning and not just nodding their heads.