ATLANTA — It's one of the oldest sporting groups around metro Atlanta. St. Andrew Rowing was established 33 years ago in 1988.
The organization is dedicated to developing, instructing and training the best youth rowers in the region.
St. Andrew regularly competes at major regional and national rowing championships. Many kids have been able to garner collegiate rowing scholarships around the country.
Georgia Tech started a rowing team 35 years ago with one of it’s most ardent supporters, John Hunter.
Hunter helped build a boat house on the Chattahoochee behind St. Andrew Catholic Church.
There was one stipulation: the church required Georgia Tech to start a youth only program for kids, who lived nearby. Years later, the program has grown incredibly.
"The best community I've ever been with," Club member and local high school student Ashlyn Elwood said. "We're a small team but we brought the most people to nationals. We had a few medalists. And at the Dogwood Regatta, we swept gold."
In the last decade, the team has dominated and they've been a power nationally. Every major competition has a St. Andrew presence, including the NCAA championships. They are also the only group to have an indoor training facility.
There are various levels to St. Andrew Rowing: the varsity, the men’s, the women's and a novice program.
"There are boats with nine people, and some with one person," Elwood explained. "In about six minutes, we can do about 2,000 meters, and we count it based on how many strokes we can do in a minute."
The program hails an athlete Paris Burbine, who made the U.S. Junior National Team and is currently competing in Bulgaria at Junior Worlds. Burbine just graduated in May.
St. Andrew Rowing is building off recent past successes by now-collegiate rowing alums including a rower for the University of Texas, the NCAA National Championship winner three weeks ago, as well as other rowers at Tennessee and SMU, who also competed at the NCAA Championships, and a coxswain at perennial power University of Washington. St. Andrew has several current rowers who have been invited to U.S. Rowing under-19 National Team Select Camp, the Olympic Development Camp and several high performance camps this summer, as well as several rowers moving on to collegiate rowing careers this fall.
St. Andrew's most recent season began Aug. 23.
For more information on how to get involved, visit their website.