The John McCorkle Race

John rowed at Penn AC in the mid-1990's (the good old days). In 1996 he dropped me an email a week before the regatta (I'd never met John at that point) pleading that I add the Mens Pair with Coxswain (M2+), or, as Ed Hewitt calls it, "The Floating Leg Press", to the Independence Day Regatta. It seems John was preparing for trials in the M2+ and wanted a race in preparation. So I added the event and got 1 or 2 other entries and we had a race.

The same thing happened in 1997. In February, I swear to myself there will be no M2+ in this year's IDR (I hate 2 or 3 boat races.), John drops me an email a week before the regatta, I add the event, and we have a 2 or 3 boat race.

Same thing happens in 1998. The race is labeled the John McCorkle M2+ on the regatta schedule and in the official results.

In 1999, pretty much the same thing happens, except this time I'm coming home from the National Championship Regatta a week before the IDR and the plane is delayed leaving Indianapolis. I end up drinking in the airport bar with some guys from Penn AC (but not John McCorkle) and some women from NYAC. The NYAC women ask me to add a womens straight pair (W2-) race to IDR and I agree (succumb?).

I get back to Philadelphia and (now sober) consider the possibility of not one but two 2 or 3 boat pair races and decide to combine them into one event, the John McCorkle M2+/W2-. A tradition is born.

In 2000, we had five entrants in the W2-, so we held a heat with the top three boats advancing to the finals of the John McCorkle race.

In 2001, to John's shame, only one men's boat entered but six womens pairs entered. The women had a six boat heat on Friday, with the top five advancing to the John McCorkle final on Saturday.

In 2002, there were seven W2- and NO M2+ (John weeps). The women ahd heats on Friday and a six boat final on Sunday.

And that's the format this year. The John McCorkle M2+/W2- will have up to three mens pairs with coxswain and three womens straight pairs, with heats if necessary to winnow the field to three. It's worth noting (women!) that only one women's boat, Kate Ackerman and Jana Heere in 1999, has ever beaten a men's boat in this event.

John left Philadelphia in 1999 and now lives in North Carolina. He returns each year to row the IDR and present the wristwatches to the winner of the John McCorkle race.. He rowed the single in 2000, winning the mens intermediate single (MI1x). He rowed the M1x in 2001, finishing 5th in his heat. He did not compete in 2002 but expects to race the single again in 2003. Though John now longer rows the Floating Leg Press, his memory lives on.

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