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Vote for Francis "Conn" Findlay for the USOPC Hall of Fame: Voting open through April 14
In partnership with the USOPC, the USRowing Pathways Program is a multi-phased, age-based approach to developing athletes in the safest, most productive way possible. USRowing identifies talented athletes with the potential to grow within the greater National Team system. We provide these athletes with challenging, yet developmentally appropriate opportunities.
Applications are open! Camp applications are now in the Member Portal.
To Apply: Log in to your USRowing member portal HERE
Coxswains: All coxswains applications require three steps. Step 1: Submit an application in the member portal. Step 2: Please submit your additional materials (race recording, etc.) by completing this FORM. If you are applying to both SDC and PDC, you only need to complete this form once. Step 3: Please instruct your current Head Coach to submit your recommendation by completing this FORM. If you are applying to both SDC and PDC, your coach only needs to complete this form once.
Scholarship: For those facing a financial hardship, USRowing has a limited amount of scholarship funds for PDC through the United We Row Scholarship Program. Apply for a scholarship by completing this FORM.
All coaches on staff are required to have a First Aid/CPR certification, SafeSport training, Boater Safety education, and a detailed background check. All of our coaches are USRowing Level 2 certified and many of them have completed the USRowing Level 3 certification – the highest level certification available for coaches in the United States. The staff has a plethora of coaching experience, covering introductory youth levels through high-performance international rowing.
Sean McCourt is currently head coach for The McCallie School in Chattanooga, TN. He began rowing in high school at St. Joseph's Prep in Philadelphia and went on to row for Boston University, where he graduated with a B.S. in secondary education. During that time, he was selected to attend the U.S. Nations Cup (Under 23) Lightweight Team Camp in 1998 and Lightweight Selection Camp in 1999 and was runner-up in the lightweight pair at the 2000 World Championships Trials.
Outside of McCallie, McCourt's coaching experience includes St. Joseph's Prep, where he was an assistant coach before starting the PNRA/Mercer program. He spent the next decade building the Mercer Juniors into a perennial contender. Still, more importantly, a strong community that encapsulated athletes from suburban areas and inner-city neighborhoods in Trenton, N.J. McCourt also has spent several years helping with the USRowing U17 development program. He has served as the head coach for the Midwest & Central Region boys' squad from 2019-2022. Since 2023, he has identified and recruited athletes and oversaw the camp's logistical operations.
Over the years, he has helped many athletes achieve their goal of competing on the collegiate level. His crews have achieved victories and medals at the USRowing Youth National Championships, SRAA Nationals, Head of the Charles, Head of the Schuylkill, Head of the Hooch, Stotesbury Cup, Northeast/Mid-Atlantic Youth Championships, Reading Amateur Regatta (UK), Women’s Henley Regatta (UK), Southeast Youth Championships, Philadelphia City Championships, and the ODP Challenge, among others.
Amanda (Polk) Sobolewski is a two-time Olympian and a 2016 Olympic Gold Medalist in the Women’s 8+ for the Rio Games. Before this accomplishment, she was a 5-time World Champion in the Women’s 8+ in 2010, ’11, ’13, ’14, ’15). She was in the previous two World Record breaking Women’s 8+ in 2012 and 2013 in the World Cup 3 in Lucerne, Switzerland. She is a 5-time World Cup Winner in the Women’s 8+ and a silver medalist at the 2009 World Rowing Championships in the Women’s 4-. Sobolewski’s first international gold was in 2008 in the Under 23 World Championship Women’s 8+. However, her first international appearance was in 2004 at the Junior World Championships in the Women’s 8+, finishing 7th overall. She attributes her Junior National experience to being her inspiration to row at the National and Olympic level.
After retiring from Olympic training, Sobolewski moved to Easley, South Carolina, where she worked as an assistant coach at Clemson University from Spring 2017 to 2018.
Megan (Dirkmaat) McCourt began rowing in high school at the Los Gatos Rowing Club in California. Her success there led to a rowing scholarship at The University of California-Berkeley. She was invited to her first national team camp in 1998 and became a permanent resident at the Princeton Training Center in 2001 after graduating from Berkeley.
Megan made her first national team in 2001, racing in the women’s 8+ at the FISA World Championship in Lucerne, Switzerland. She went on to make the 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, and 2007 National Teams. In 2004, Megan was a member of the women’s 8+ that won gold in the Munich and Lucerne World Cups, and a silver medal at the Olympic Games in Athens, Greece. This crew also set a world-best time in the Olympic heat of the women’s 8+. After a post-Olympic break, which included a stint coaching at Stanford University, Megan returned to Princeton. She earned a spot in the women’s 8+ for the 2005 World Championship in Gifu, Japan.
Following the World Championship in 2005, Megan decided to take the 2006 season off and attend graduate school at the University of Washington. After graduating with a Master of Education in Intercollegiate Athletic Leadership, Megan returned to Princeton for the 2007 rowing season. She was selected to stroke the women’s 4- at the Munich World Championship, capturing the gold medal and upsetting the heavily favored Germans on their home course.
Daniel Beery is an Oaktown, Indiana native who started rowing in college at the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga. After graduating, he continued training at Penn AC and NYAC. As a Senior National Team member, Beery has had many successes, including an Olympic gold medal in 2004 in the Men’s 8+. A few of his additional rowing accomplishments include: 2002 World Championships Silver Medal - Men's 2+, 2003 World Championships Gold Medal - Men's 2+, 2004 Lucerne World Cup Gold Medal - Men's 4-, 2005 Gifu World Championships Gold Medal - Men's 8+, 2007 Pan Am Games Gold Medal - Men's 8+, 2007 Pan Am Games Silver Medal - Men's 2-, and 2007 World Championships Gold Medal - Men's 4+.
Beery has coached rowing at Chattanooga Juniors, the McCallie School, St. Joseph's Preparatory, and Upper Merion High School.
Al Morrow has spent most of his life rowing. His involvement as an athlete culminated in 1976, when he was a member of the team that represented Canada at the Olympics in Montreal. The previous year, he had won a bronze medal with the coxless four at the Pan American Games in Mexico City. He also participated in three World Championships: 1970, 1974, and 1975.
Soon after the 1976 Olympics, Morrow became Head Coach of the men’s rowing team at UBC. Just a year later, he was made an Assistant Coach with the national team at the World Championships, and it has been in coaching that he has made his most significant contributions to rowing. Morrow became Head Coach of the University of Victoria rowing team in 1978.
Over the next decade, he led the team to two championship titles. It was during this time that he became the National Head Coach, starting with the 1980 Olympic team. The 1980 Olympics was the first of six Olympics as a coach for Morrow. He also went on to coach Canadian rowers at over 17 World Championships.
Although he moved to the University of Western Ontario in 1988 to focus on women’s rowing, Morrow continued his work at the national level, where he coached women’s rowing for 16 years (1988-2004).
It was in 1992, at the Olympics in Barcelona, that the team reached its zenith. The duo of Marnie McBean and Kathleen Heddle won two gold medals at those Games, a feat that put the rowers and Morrow in the world spotlight. Morrow’s rowers also won three medals at the 1996 Olympics and one more medal in 2000. In 1999, FISA named him coach of the year.
In all, Morrow’s athletes have won a combined 25 World Championship and Olympic medals since 1991.
Micah Boyd started rowing at the Minnesota Boat Club as a sophomore in High School. Primarily a sweep rower, he was forced to scull due to the small size of the team and no pair event at Youth Nationals. He and his brother won the Youth 2x their senior year. He then enrolled at Wisconsin and rowed in the Varsity 8 for 3 years, with the best finish being sophomore year, winning Eastern Sprints and finishing 2nd at IRAs.
After college, Boyd made the 2005 US National Team, winning a bronze medal at the World Championships in the Men’s 2+. He went on to make the 2008 Olympic Team, winning a bronze medal in the Men’s 8+. In addition to his successful Olympic debut, Boyd was also named Athlete of the Year by USRowing.
Boyd has coached in a variety of college and high school settings. He started at Emory University coaching women's basketball, then coached the UNC-Chapel Hill Men’s team for 6 years, receiving the ACRA Coach of the Year award in 2015. Then, he switched teams and went to Duke University as an assistant coach for the women’s team.
Garrison Smith is the Director of Rowing and head boys’ coach at Baylor School in Chattanooga, TN. Smith began his rowing career as a walk-on at Yale University and played hockey for two years. He rowed in multiple grand finals at Eastern Sprints as an oarsman and won the Head of the Charles, Canadian Henley, and the U.S. Olympic Festival.
Smith began coaching at his alma mater, Northfield Mt. Hermon, in 1997, and then spent six years building a successful boys' program at The Taft School. He later moved to Kent School, beginning as an assistant for the boys' team before taking over as head of the girls' program in 2007.
Past summers have found him busy coaching at Princeton and with the Southeast Juniors. Most recently, he has been coaching for USRowing’s ODP and YDC camps. Smith was selected to be the head coach of the USRowing Northeast ODP camp in 2020, and served as an assistant coach for the Southeast ODP camp in 2021. In 2022, he served as the head coach for the Southeast ODP camp.
Smith has helped to build two programs into perennial New England contenders, and his boats have won multiple medals and the team championship at NEIRA. His crews have won stateside at the National Schools Regatta and internationally at the Reading Amateur Regatta and have been two-time finalists at the Henley Women's Regatta. The consistent success of Smith's teams and programs is notable. The Kent girls were among the top three teams in NEIRA in 10 out of 11 years, with the first varsity eight medaling in the NEIRA finals for 10 consecutive years.
Cory Sanderson has worked with the Men's Junior National Team system at the Olympic Development Program, Development, High Performance, Youth Regional Challenge, and Selection levels in Pittsburgh, Maine, Oregon, Florida, and California over the last decade. Over those years, he has coached crews that have consistently made the finals and found themselves on the podium at USRowing Summer Nationals at the U17, U19, Intermediate, and Senior levels, with athletes continuing on to medal at CanAmMex, Junior World Championships, and beyond in subsequent years.
He coached at Nashville Rowing in Tennessee for 10 years and served as the Executive Director since 2017. Since 2014, Nashville has had athletes earn 35 invites to all levels of JNT camps, medal at CanAmMex, Junior World Championships, World Indoor Championships, HOCR, hold World Records, and graduate with scholarships earning medals at NCAAs, Eastern Sprints, and IRAs. Nashville Rowing has qualified boats for the USRowing Youth National Championship every year since 2014, with athletes competing in the 2x, 2-, 4+, Ltwt 4+, and 8+. Sanderson looks forward to continuing the development of athletes from all over the country at Pathways Development Camp, and is excited to continue developing the next generation of great rowers and community leaders.
Grace Malacrida currently resides in Colorado. She began rowing in 1981 at Rutgers University and is still passionate about the sport today. She earned her Masters in Sports Management and served as an officer in the United States Air Force.
Malacrida is a USRowing Level III certified coach and co-founder of Mile High Rowing Club, Colorado’s most successful youth rowing program. For 15 straight years she has qualified boats for Youth Nationals and has had several boats medal and place in the top 10, including the W1x, W2-, W4+ and M4-.
A rower still today, Malacrida won two gold medals at the 2023 San Diego Crew Classic, a bronze medal at the 2022 Head of the Charles Regatta in the Grandmaster Women’s 8+, and five gold medals at the 2022 World Master Rowing Championships in Libourne, France.
Walker Ferris is originally from Savannah, GA, and rowed for the Savannah Country Day School. He then attended the University of Georgia, where he rowed for four years, and double majored in economics and history.
After graduating, Ferris coached high school rowing in Jacksonville, FL, from 2015 to 2017 before returning to Athens, GA, to lead the men's rowing program at the University of Georgia from 2017 to 2021. He currently serves as the men’s head coach at St. Andrews Rowing Club.
Ferris has coached for the USRowing U19 National Team System and Olympic Development Program for the past several years.
Jack Impronto is currently the men’s assistant coach at Wesleyan University. Prior to Wesleyan, he served as the head boys coach at Glastonbury High School, and led the team to many successful placings in the Connecticut Public Scholastic Rowing Association. Impronto has been coaching for USRowing’s youth development program since 2021.
Impronto rowed for Glastonbury High School for 4 years, then rowed at Trinity College, where he graduated with a Bachelor of Science in Mathematics.
Larkin Brown is currently an assistant coach at the University of Southern California. Prior to coaching at USC, Brown coached for the Girls Preparatory School in Chattanooga, TN. In 2024, she joined the coaching staff at USRowing’s Youth Development Camp.
A 2023 graduate of Virginia, Brown was a co-captain as a senior. She was a member of UVA’s ACC title-winning Second Varsity Eight in 2022 and also won an ACC title in the 2021 Varsity Four. In 2023, she helped UVA’s Varsity Eight take second at the ACC Championships and 11th at the NCAA Championship.
A native of Ringold, Ga., Brown earned a silver medal with Team USA in the women’s eight at the 2018 Junior Rowing Worlds in the Czech Republic. Brown earned a degree in government and history from UVA and has also been involved with community outreach.
Richmond Coney is currently an assistant coach for Princeton University’s open women’s rowing team. Before coaching at Princeton, he attended The McCallie School in Chattanooga, Tennessee. After high school, he competed collegiately for Drexel University, where he served as a team captain, leading the team to its third consecutive Dad Vail Championship and a program-best performance at IRAs.
Camp invitations will start at the beginning of February and will continue on a rolling basis through late May.
Depending on when you submit your information and when you attended an ID Camp, you may be waiting to hear from us. Be patient and continue to work hard.
You will receive directions from your camp director regarding the remaining balance payment and any additional requirements.
Payment is due in full by May 1st.
Yes. Once you accept your invitation, you will receive directions from your camp director on the required forms for your specific camp.
Plan on rowing A LOT! There are laundry facilities, but a general rule of thumb is to pack a week’s worth of clothing.
Essentials
•You will need to provide your own bedding and pillow.
• Spending money for incidentals. While not necessary, it can be helpful to have some money to spend on things like extra snacks or movies.
• Sunscreen
• Bath Towels
• Running Shoes
• Rowing Clothes (anticipate 11-12 sessions per week)
• Clothes for the dorm
• 1-2 sets of nicely casual clothes
• Rain Gear
• Nalgene or other types of water bottles (more than one is a good idea)
• Day pack or small duffle
• Alarm Clock
• Necessary Medication
• Hygiene products
• Needed athletic training items (foam rollers, bands, recovery items.)
• Coxswains – Tape Recorder (if you don’t have one, purchase one before arriving. They are very helpful, and you’ll be able to use them after the camp as well.)
• Coxswains – Cox Box (if you don’t have your own, please try and borrow one from your program. Let us know if you are unable to bring one as we should be able to provide one.)
Permitted (but not required)
• Laptop Computers/Tablets (wireless internet is available)
• Speaker System
• Video Game System
• Movies
• Heart Rate Monitor
Prohibited (not exhaustive, use your judgement)
• Hot Plates
• Candles
• Fireworks
• Knives
• Weapons
• Drugs, alcohol, tobacco
• Electronic cigarettes
Athletes will be housed in the dorms of The University of Tennessee Chattanooga.
Supervision Coaches and interns will be staying in the dorms as well. These individuals will be USRowing-certified coaches who have passed background checks and have completed our SafeSport training requirement.
Family Visits Parents are welcome to visit their rowers during camp but will need to be flexible on the timing. Visits will need to fall outside of training and any scheduled camp meetings or events.
To/From Camp Athletes are responsible for their travel to camp and home from camp.
Shuttles will be provided to/from CHA. Other airport options include ATL and BNA, but campers will need to arrange their own transportation to/from these airports via the Groome Shuttle or another private option.
While racing is not the primary focus of YDC, athletes still will get the opportunity to line up against each other at the informal Summer Cup race at the end of camp.
Race Date TBA
Race Location GPS McCallie Rowing Center
Parent Attendance Parents are more than welcome and encouraged to attend the Summer Cup.
More details to come!
There will be a full time paramedic on staff who will be residing in the dorm. If medical attention is required beyond her scope, she will accompany the athlete to urgent care or the hospital.
We strive to make our camps accessible and affordable to families and athletes in need. If you are in need of a scholarship, please fill out the application provided above.
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