The Women’s Eight in Solothurn — rowing our way back to the regatta scene one sweep at a time

In September 2019 Suzanne wrote an email to some new rowing ladies: “Hej, är det inte dags för er att börja med sweep rowing (eller enårsrodd, som vi säger på svenska)? ”. 

This initiative led to some first outings, followed by another posting by Teresia in October 2020: "Efter en paus på tolv år har vi glädjen att meddela att Nordiska har en damåtta på vatten i igen! Damåttan kallad Sweep them off their feet tränar varje torsdag morgon.” 

This rather ambitious initiative, given that there were barely a dozen sweep rowing ladies at Nordiska, survived with an active core group that kept showing up, gratefully borrowing ladies from neighbouring clubs and stealing men from the Nordiska crews. Suspiciously male-looking individuals, lovingly called hens (Swedish gender neutrum), with names like Martina, Patricia and Erica frequently appeared on the crew list, helping us fill the seats.

During the last year we have received a welcome addition of a handful new ladies who are eager to row. This welcome addition to our regular trainings together with some coaching culminated in our decision to stop waiting to be ready and just, as they say, do it. We entered our first regatta as a Nordiska Women’s Eight since 2008 by participating in the Sunday Race. We had so much fun that we decided on the spot to register for the next one. Enter Solothurn. 

Coming in as an underdog is a really good place to grow from. Nordiska, sometimes called the “drinking club with a rowing problem” is famous for emphasising the social aspect as much as the race focus. This was the mindset of the ladies cramped into a "club bus”, also known as family Volvo, heading towards Solothurn (other crew members joined later bringing cox, ground support, champagne and other essential race elements). Our aim was mainly to have fun, get some experience and probably come in as the last, but possibly the happiest, boat. 

The regatta morning started with the inevitable pre-race events; hunting for a last-minute unisuit, messed-up train schedules and a missed race information event. Still, the crew kept up the spirits, got the information needed, found the trailer, spotted the info sheet and boat number, assembled the boat and excitedly entered onto the Aare river. 

From the start our boat was gliding like it has never done before, smooth and balanced. Our Torbjörn cox kept adding calm into the boat reminding the eager crew to sloooow down the slide. At the half-way turning point we did a film-worthy turn and realised that our steady pace gave us plenty of energy to keep rowing the second half of the 10 km. As cox was telling us we were closing in on the two boats ahead we could barely believe it. Keeping up the pace and strength all the way to end we rowed into a fifth place with a time we hadn’t believed possible. To give you an idea of the grit put into the boat, stroke Linn’s bleeding hand made cox’s shoes and trousers look like he came from a slaughter house. As cherry on top, cox took us on a cruise through the old town of Solothurn as a cool down exercise. 

The joy, the happiness, the almost magical feeling of reaching this milestone together was palpable. As we sipped our celebratory champagne we reflected on the fantastic team spirit, the togetherness, the support, the feeling of having won. More than the fifth place, we celebrated that we had won ourselves, as individuals and as a team. A huge thank you goes out to everyone who has been part of this journey, helping us re-create the Nordiska Women’s Eight. To both the crew in Solothurn as well as the crew back in Zurich, you are an amazing group of individuals! Immensely grateful to be part of this.