1st Regatta for Crew Team Sunday

New Team Holds Last Fall Practice, Heads into 1st Competition

Several members of the newly-formed Medford High School crew team on the Gentle Giant Rowing Club dock on the Malden River.  Other members not pictured.

– Allison Goldsberry

Come Sunday, Medford’s first-ever crew team will hit the water for its first competition, and Coach Amy Byron couldn’t be happier.

“I’m really proud of them all,” said Byron, a former coxswain who established a rowing club in England.

After five years of talks, the Mustang crew team is finally rowing thanks to a partnership with the Gentle Giant Rowing Club, which also sponsors teams for Somerville and Malden high school students.

The partnership with Gentle Giant provides access to boat houses and more than $150,000 in rowing equipment, as well as money for coaching staff.

According to Byron, one of Medford High’s newest chemistry teachers, about twenty Medford High School students signed up for the team this season, many of them Byron’s homeroom and chemistry students.

Byron expects more students in the spring, especially boys that are looking for another sport. Mostly girls rowed for the Mustangs this fall.

The fall season was about getting warmed up and learning the basics, as all but one student have never rowed before.

The team held its last practice on Friday and is heading into its first competition on Sunday, the Mass Public High School Fall Championship Regatta, held on Worcester’s Lake Quinsigamond.

The new Mustang rowers are thrilled to be part of Medford’s first crew team, blisters and all.

“It’s about time Medford had a cool sport,” said Meagan Dinocco, a senior. Her teammates all cheered in agreement.