Rachel's official visits

School began for both me and Rachel last week. We are both fairly swamped with school work, especially since Rachel has to do catch up with a heavy summer reading list for her AP English class. Then there is the business of finding a good school and college rowing program for Rachel. Since eLynnikins is mostly about Rachel these days, I thought I'd fill everyone in on schools Rachel is visiting. NCAA rules allow 5 official visits per prospective student athlete. They can have as many unofficial visits as they want. The thing that distinguishes an official from an unofficial visit is that the College pays for something--a meal, a plane ticket, gas money, etc. There are lots of good schools with good women's rowing programs, so it's hard to narrow it down. The head coach from Louisville advised Rachel to "go with her gut" when making a decision, which is really good advice, I think. Anyway, every school she contacted in June has called or emailed her (except for Cal, but they sent literature), and every coach Rachel talked to invited her for an official visit.

The three schools she is visiting so far are: Tennessee, Louisville, and Rhode Island. UT has a very strong program: they were rated No. 6 in the NCAA polls at the end of last season. Rachel met their coaches and really likes them all, plus she rowed with them last summer during camp. Knoxville seems like a nice city, but Rachel thinks Louisville is more attractive. Louisville did really well last year, and were ranked No. 20 in NCAA polls earlier in the season, which is pretty amazing for a small program. UL also had their first All-American last year, which is pretty exciting. The coaches are also great, Rachel likes Richard Ruggieri and Laura Fogt a lot. URI is not as strong nationally as the other two schools, but they offer sculling--they are part of the Atlantic Conference, which has sculling races. Their coach, Julia Chilicki-Beasley, is an Olympic sculler. She is also pregnant with her second child, which is pretty cool. Apparently she has a little boy too. Anyway, all of the schools have scholarship money for rowers. Rachel will just have to check it out, and see what feels best and makes the most sense. All three schools are very interested in Rachel, which is good because I want her to go somewhere where they are happy to have a fine athlete like her. I suspect it will be a difficult choice for her, because all the coaches are talented and motivated and personable. So we'll see.

In the wings are UCF (University of Central Florida), a HUGE school (34,000 undergrads!), but the coaches sound so nice over the phone and emails and are so upbeat, Rachel might consider squeezing in another official visit this Fall. Rachel was really interested in UMass because it's a fine school with a great program, and their recruiting coach sent lots of nice emails to Rachel, but for some reason he never called (coaches are allowed to call recruits once a week beginning July 1). Maybe he has some hot recruits in line or something, but it's hard for me to imagine someone who is trying to recruit young women without getting on the phone. So if anyone knows anything about these schools, let us know. Rachel visits UL and URI in September, then UT in Ocober. It's going to be a very busy fall.