Bouncing back from a loss at Lawrenceville last week, the dynamic community of the KSBC team is ready for action. After their stunning victories this weekend and last over St. John’s and Andover respectively, they have demonstrated a positive path for the season.

The first boat race against St. John’s began with difficulty for the boys. “The first boat had a rough race,” says Ray Cutting ’19. “For the first 650 meters out of 1,500, we were down. Our start was terrible. It was poor.”

However, the team banded together to rise against this challenge. They were, sadly, without their dynamic teammate Nicholas Fisher ’19, but this loss inspired strength. “We pulled a power ten for Nick Fisher who was ill that day. He was very sad he couldn’t be with us at the race, and so we put some power in for him,” says Cutting.

In the words of Tristan Jamidar ’19, another first boat rower, “I think this race against St John’s was a really good building point for our team. They showed up and gave us a really good fight for the first five hundred, and then we were kind of rewarded for staying tough throughout the race and not giving up an inch.”

However, it wasn’t only the first boat that excelled. Jonas Schemm ’20, second boat rower, describes the immense victory simply: “the boys did have a clean sweep,” meaning all the boats won their races. In addition to the all-around victory over St John’s, the boys just recently swept more wins against Andover this weekend.

As a part of the KSBS, the boys form a tight-knit community. Schemm reflects that he feels as though “KSBC has been a pretty important component of my identity here at Kent. It’s really been a real brotherhood to me.”

For Jamidar, who came here as a postgraduate student, says that “the whole team is a lot closer than other teams I’ve been on.” He says that the spring training trip in Clemson “brought everybody closer together. All in all, it’s just kind of like a big family. It’s a great community to be a part of.”

In terms of the future of the team, Cutting remarks, “This year is the first year we’ve had a fifth boat,” which shows the strength and depth of the team–there are more rowers than ever before.

Schemm says “Although we have a lot of seniors graduating from [the] first boat, we have a lot of strong novices that will continue to impress in the upcoming years.” Cutting agrees, saying that this year is “pretty strong” and that “the next couple years are going to be as good, if not better.”