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Distant Regatta Directions

St. Andrew's School, Middletown, Delaware · Take I-495 to Rt. 50 East
· Continue on Rt. 50 over the Bay Bridge until it turns into Rt. 301
· Continue on Rt. 301 North into Delaware (about 43 miles) · About 3.5 miles after the Delaware state line (where the road becomes two lanes), turn right at the first light onto Rt. 299 East and go into the center of Middletown after the railroad tracks. · At the next light, turn right onto Rt. 71 South and continue exactly 1.3 miles (past Middletown High School, past Old St. Anne's Church on the right with a low brick wall) until you come to Noxontown Road (Road 38) on your left. The road is not well marked. It is at the bottom of a hill. Look up the road for an "Adopt a Highway" sign that says St. Andrews. Turn left there and continue up that road exactly .8 miles past St. Andrews School. You will pass the pond on your right, then enter the park on your right.

Stotesbury Cup Regatta, Philadelphia, PA We are staying at the Holiday Inn City Line at 4100 Presidential Blvd. Call (215)477-0200 for reservations, be sure to tell them that you are with Jefferson Crew.
Take 1-95 North. After the Philadelphia Airport, take 291 East to I-76 (Schuylkill Expressway) West. Go through Philly to exit 33, City Avenue, Rt. 1 South. At the first light, turn left onto Presidential Blvd. Take an immediate left into the hotel parking lot (just behind TJI Fridays).
Jefferson Crew has two buses that will shuttle rowers and family members to and from the race course all day Friday and Saturday. We recommend that you park at the hotel and ride the shuttle no matter where you are staying. This is much easier than trying to park at the race course.

Scholastic Nationals, Cooper River, Cherry Hill, NJ Take I-95 North past the Philadelphia airport to the Walt Whitman Bridge. Cross over the bridge, then follow Rt. 130 North to Rt. 70 East. About three miles after the bridge is the Howard Johnson's Express Inn on your right. The regatta is held at the park across the street in the back of the hotel.

A Tough Row to Hoe

At Jefferson, a Coach's Love of Crew Lives On

By Kynan W. Kelly
Special to The Washington Post
Saturday, April 27, 2002; Page D01

Jefferson's rowing team are wearing are black shirts to honor their coach, Eric Rothstein, who was murdered. "Eric was the soul of the team," TJ's Michael Gottlieb said. (Larry Kobelka — For The Washington Post)

Jim Granger, right, took over as Jefferson's varsity boys coach for Eric Rothstein, who guided the boys to five state titles. (Larry Kobelka - The Washington Post)

Eric Rothstein lived for rowing. And now, it is rowing that is helping his Jefferson High School team cope with his death.
Rothstein, 36, the rowing head coach at Jefferson since 1997, was stabbed to death in his home two days after Thanksgiving. His wife, Seema Rothstein, who was taking medication to fight postpartum depression, according to court papers, has been charged with his murder.
His death devastated the Jefferson rowing team. Rothstein, the 1996 All-Met Coach of the Year, was largely responsible for molding a local powerhouse out of a 3-year-old Jefferson program with no financial backing from the school district. During his tenure, the varsity girls won three Virginia state championships, and the varsity boys won five of the past six state titles.
This morning, at the Virginia Scholastic Rowing Championships on the Occoquan Reservoir, Rothstein's loss will be felt most acutely at the site of his greatest triumphs.
"States will be the hardest," senior John Cancian said. "I remember giving him a big hug after [Jefferson's victory] last year."
"When we won states, that was the biggest smile I've ever seen on a man's face," senior Tommy Velarde said. "He handed me the trophy . . . from that moment on I've fallen in love with the sport. I polished that trophy and brought it to the wake."
Every team member wears a commemorative shirt -- emblazoned with "EHR" (for Eric Haskell Rothstein) and "1993-2001" (his years at Jefferson) -- at practices and during qualifying heats. But the athletes have kept other reminders of Rothstein more private.
"There's no talking about it all that much," said Matt Shoop, who has assumed Rothstein's head coaching and administrative duties. "They're excited about racing. But it will really hit when they get to states."
Five months ago, the Jefferson rowers were faced with returning to vigorous winter workouts just days after Rothstein's death. But they rowed as much for therapy as for physical preparation, and intensity at the workouts increased remarkably.
"There was more winter training, more people there, than ever," Velarde said. "It was one way we all dealt with it."
Still, the rowers admit that Rothstein's absence doesn't seem real.
"I saw all those photos of him at the funeral, but I kept expecting him there, at his own funeral," Velarde said. "I mean, it was a crew function, and he was always there at crew functions.
"I kept expecting him there at the first practice, in his hat and sunglasses."

Terrible, Unbelievable

Rothstein's love of rowing was infectious. He began rowing at Michigan State University and coached the men's novices while in graduate school at the University of Michigan. He urged his younger brother, Mark, a football captain in high school, to row when Mark enrolled at Michigan. Mark now coaches the Wolverines' women's crew team -- which was second at the NCAA championships last year -- and was named national coach of the year by the Collegiate Rowing Coaches Association.
"I had never met the guy, but he came up to me my sophomore year and said, 'You're big, you're strong, you should row,' " said Velarde, who made the varsity boat as a novice -- a rare feat in rowing. "I was so bewildered by his command . . . his presence. As soon as he opened his mouth, you wanted to listen. I rowed every day for Eric, to prove to him that I was worth the time he took with me."
In a journal on the Jefferson rowing Web site, Rothstein wrote: "This sport has become such a huge part of my life that I cannot imagine what I would be doing now had I not found rowing."
Rothstein treated his rowers like family, acting as a coach and a father figure, and included his family in rowing as well. Seema and their yellow Labrador retriever, Kudra, were at nearly every regatta, and entertained rowers when they would visit the couple's home. Many friends find it incomprehensible that she has been indicted for murder and will stand trial May 13 -- two days after the team competes in the capital area championship regatta.
"We have given notice [to the court] of the possibility of an insanity plea," said Seema Rothstein's attorney, Peter D. Greenspun.
"The whole thing is terrible, unbelievable," said Eric's father, Haskell Rothstein, who has visited his daughter-in-law's family in Burke several times to grieve and be with his granddaughter, Kayla, now 7 months old. "My inclination is to support [Seema] and her family. . . . If she was in her right mind, it never would have happened.
"She grieves for Eric all the time. Some day she'll have to explain to her daughter why she doesn't have a father."

Huge Impact

More than 500 attended Rothstein's memorial service. Many of the mourners were current and former rowers from Jefferson and the Northern Virginia Rowing Club, which he started two years ago with former Hylton coach Erik Nienaber. The club now has close to 100 members and ranks with the Old Dominion Boat Club as one of the strongest clubs in the region.
"The guy had a huge impact on area rowing," said John David, the boys' coach at Robinson, where Rothstein taught seventh and eighth grades several years ago. "The boathouse definitely is not the same."
The rowing club helped form a select team of the area's best rowers to compete in offseason regattas. Last fall's third annual Occoquan Challenge, another of Rothstein's projects, attracted 1,500 rowers and was dominated by NVRC's 22 boats.
As the coaches' representative to the Crew Council, a committee of athletic directors that oversees rowing in the area, Rothstein forged recent improvements in Northern Virginia rowing -- including the creation of a points trophy system, a more organized schedule and a rule change intended to get more female coxswains involved in the sport.
"Before he was the coaches' representative, this was just a motley group of people showing up on the weekends for regattas," Nienaber said. "He made a dramatic difference. If there was one guy who had a tremendous interest in rowing in the area, that would be Eric."

Inspiration

Shoop and Jim Granger, the former freshman boys' coach who took over Rothstein's successful varsity boys' boats, have also confronted the emotional void left by the death of their friend and colleague.
Granger said he and Shoop prepared for the season-opening Polar Bear Regatta by going to Saratoga Pizzeria in Springfield -- a casual pre-race tradition that he and Rothstein had struck up.
"Eric and I had gone to this restaurant one Friday and the next day the guys won unexpectedly, so we were, like, 'Man, we have to come back here!' " said Granger, a former Jefferson rower who graduated the year before Rothstein arrived. "I got pretty sick of it after a while, but we kept on going pretty religiously."
They won the season-opening Polar Bear Regatta behind a powerful boys' varsity eight which returned five rowers, including All-Met six-seat Michael Gottlieb and All-Met honorable mentions Velarde and Leo Hergenroeder.
"A lot of teams didn't expect us to get it together for this year, they thought it would take a year," Gottlieb said. "Eric was the soul of the team. . . . But it's not like it's taken the heart out of the team."
Cheering the Jefferson crew from the banks that day was Eric's father, wearing his son's cap.
"The outpouring of support has been so incredible," he said. "We'll always be close to the TJ crew . . . and Eric will always be close to them."

27 April Jefferson's Boys Varsity eight won the Virginia Scholastic Rowing Championship for the sixth time in the last seven years on the Occoquan. The Colonials finished in 4:25.70. Jefferson's Girls Varsity eight finished third behind TC Williams and Robinson with a time of 5:07.00.