ROWING ON A
THE RIVERS
The Peters Township Rowing Club
brings a new sports opportunity to
students of the South Hills.
BY NICOLE TAFE
PT Rowing Club
founder, Judy
Alexander.
54 724.942.0940 TO ADVERTISE | Peters Township
s a two-year member of the
Pittsburgh Rowing Club, Judy
Alexander would watch two
high school teams row out of the
same boathouse each day and began
to wonder why Peters Township did
not have a rowing team of its own. She
started to look into rowing teams in
the area and learned that a multitude
of surrounding boroughs had teams
available. With this, Alexander
decided to put ideas into action and
establish Peters Township’s very own
rowing club.
Rowing is America’s oldest
intercollegiate sport and crew teams
have been established throughout the
greater tri-state area, nationally and
internationally, for over 130 years.
Locally there are approximately 17
high school competitive rowing teams
in addition to 147 postsecondary
schools that offer rowing and team
scholarships.
While Alexander really enjoyed
rowing, her expertise in organized
sports was a bit lacking, so she
enlisted the help of Pittsburgh Rowing
Club’s Director and 2012 Romanian
Olympic Rower Florin Curuea to help
her get started. Curuea has been an
athlete and coach in both Romania
and the U.S. for many years. “We
were incredibly fortunate to have
someone with his le vel of success and
Olympian-level experience work with
our upcoming team,” says Alexander.
Together, Alexander and Curuea
hosted a two-week “Learn to Row”
camp in May 2015 to enlist members
for the new club. Thirty Peters
Township students attended and
instantly fell in love with the sport.
While Curuea returned to Romania
to continue coaching the Romanian
National Team, Alexander officially
founded the Peters Township
Rowing Club and began working
with a few very devoted parents—
Lorie Strennen, Kevin and Colleen
Hannegan and Marlene Luster—to
continue to build the club and get
things rolling for a number of students
who had participated in the camp and
were eager to join the club.
Meetings became more frequent
and the group expanded its
membership opportunities by sending