Thursday, 5/15/97 Men’s, women’s crew aim for Pac-10
championships CLUB: Men’s cycling team performs strongly, earns top
three spots in state
By Rocky Salmon Daily Bruin Contributor This weekend the UCLA
men’s and women’s crew teams will travel to Sacramento to compete
in the Pacific 10 Rowing Championships. After a fast start at the
beginning of the season for the men’s crew team, the club has
struggled to retain its consistency. "We had a lot of people who
raced for us at the beginning of the season but our team has really
(been) whittled down," Gabe Novotny, a graduate student team
member, said. "We had to stop racing the standard eight and had to
resort to racing only four." Nearing the end of the season, the
crew team has steadily improved and now feels it has a chance to
upset some teams in the championships. "The last two weeks we have
done well," Novotny said. "At the beginning of the season we were
losing to Loyola Marymount and Long Beach State by at least 10
seconds. We have improved to the point that in our last regatta we
only lost to LMU by two seconds." With an upstart team, the club is
looking to shock some varsity teams. For the UCLA women’s crew team
this weekend will be a perfect place to prove a point, that it
deserves varsity status at UCLA. The women’s team has been rowing
strong and will race in two different divisions, junior varsity and
varsity. * * * Last weekend the UCLA cycling team travelled to
Stanford. The top four riders from UCLA each placed highly in their
events. For the women, Virginia Parks placed second in criterion
and ended up finishing second overall in the state. For the men the
weekend was a complete sweep for the top three riders. National
champion Keith Henderson captured his first state criterion
championship, and is now the third-ranked cyclist in the state The
first-place cyclist in the state is Henderson’s teammate, Lane
Packwood, who impressively won the road race. Jon Nobil came in
second and is now the second-ranked cyclist in the state. "The
season was outstanding. I have never seen such a set of amazing
cyclists," Henderson said. "We placed one, two, three in state, the
first time ever. Nationals is going to be an exciting event for
UCLA because all three male riders and Virginia Parks (have) a
chance to win the championship." On Memorial Day weekend the Bruins
will travel to Durango, Colo. with the nationals at stake. If one
UCLA rider can win, it will be the first time that UCLA will have
had repeating national champions.