Kirsten Girard

About Me:

I started rowing when I was 13 years old in Seattle, Washington. I spent the summer before I started high school at a learn-to-row camp and absolutely fell in love with the sport. Going into high school, I played a couple of other sports but decided that rowing was what I wanted to dedicate my time to. There was something about being on the water every day for practice that was so relaxing to me; it was different than any other sport I had done before! I spent the next four years learning more about the sport every day and becoming more devoted to rowing.

I was recruited to my dream school, the University of Tennessee, to row on their DI Women's Rowing team and was awarded a 4-year scholarship. Moving across the country to a place where I didn't know anyone was a big decision, but I quickly found my home away from home on the Lady Vol rowing team. I helped our top boat to three consecutive podium finishes at the Big 12 Championships, as well as three top-ten finishes at the Head of the Charles Regatta, the largest race in the world.

Outside of rowing, I made the Dean's list for three years and was on the SEC Academic Honor Roll for three years, as well as the Big 12 Academic All-Conference for two years.

I am currently living in Boston, Massachusetts, where I am in a graduate-level program geared towards coaching. I am coaching a collegiate team and a high school team in the area, and am loving it!

When I was going into my senior year of high school, I decided to go to a summer rowing program in Philadelphia for six weeks. The program was meant to keep us all racing and training during the summer while meeting new people and living in a new city. I was nervous about going to a new team with girls I didn't know, and I wasn't sure how I would compare to everyone else. I was also nearing the end of the college recruiting process and was busy talking with coaches to figure out where I wanted to go to school.

As we got to the end of the summer and were nearing our final race, it came time to decide who would race in which boats. I was selected for the top boat with girls who I was similar to in speed, but they were generally a bit bigger than I was. I was so happy to be in the boat and really liked the other girls a lot!

At our last race, there was a college recruiting fair, where we were able to talk to a ton of different coaches in one location after they had watched us race. To prepare us for the recruiting fair, our summer coach was asking us questions about where we wanted to go to college and why. He asked me, and I listed off a couple of colleges that I was looking into, all of which were Division I schools. He looked me up and down and laughed, saying, "you'll never be big enough or strong enough to go D-I." I was taken aback, as no one had ever told me something like that before.

I called my coach from home, and he told me not to use it as fuel to push harder and to ignore what the summer coach had said. I continued to aim high and talk to the schools that I wanted to, and was lucky enough to get into my top choice school and be successful once I got there! I'll never forget this experience because it taught me that you don't have to be the "perfect size" to do a sport well, and that hard work and believing in yourself can get you a long way.