A flow. Bodies driving in unison. Muscle yielding to rhythm and gesture. Colours bearing traditions more than a century old while, at the same time, giving form to the future of an enduring discipline. Rowing has an abiding capacity to astonish. In the heart of Turin, it becomes all the more magnetic. The Sebago Rowing Cup returned to the waters of the Po, translating the ethos of a brand deeply rooted in life on the water into an expression of athletic intensity, while bringing together rowing talent from some of the world’s foremost universities. From Oxford to the Basque Country. From Rome to Hamburg.

Competition, as rowing’s very nature demands: mixed crews, eight minds entrusted to a single motion. More profoundly, a celebration of the spirit embedded in this noble athletic art, whether encountered through its aesthetic, communal or formative dimensions. Each belongs to a discipline founded upon the delicate reciprocity between collective exertion and individual responsibility, while carrying an unmistakable visual code that has become part of its identity across the world.

Theodore Siri | University of Oxford, Matilde Paoletti | LUISS and Oscar Krause | University of Hamburg (winner of the event alongside his crew) give voice to these different dimensions. Student-athletes able to recognise, embody and extend the manifold meanings accumulated by rowing across generations, while carrying them towards whatever the discipline might become next.

Theodore Siri | University of Oxford 

“I came to rowing recently. I wasn’t particularly sporty when I was younger. I didn’t have much hand-eye coordination, I wasn’t very good at football or anything like that. Then I arrived at Oxford University, where rowing is everywhere. Everyone rows, from the lowest level to the very top, and we are fortunate to have coaches who can take you from knowing absolutely nothing about the sport to competing at a very high level.

I fell in love with it because rowing has this complete linearity. The more you practise, the better you get. There is technique, of course, but technique can be learned. In the end, so much of it comes down to committing yourself to it. And no one is a star. There are eight people in the boat and you are simply trying to become part of the machine. Nobody can carry everyone else. Nobody can decide to go solo. You have to be doing the same thing, together. I don’t think there is another team sport quite like it.

Maybe that is also why the friendships become so strong. You have to be incredibly close to the people you row with. At Oxford they come from everywhere — America, Australia, Italy, Germany, all over Europe — and eventually these become friendships for life. You have all woken up at five in the morning, six days a week, driven out together in minibuses and rowed through the dark. In winter, we often come off the water as the sun rises. The entire session has happened before daylight, with icicles hanging from the boats, freezing cold, sometimes unable to see anything except a light in front of you and another behind. You just row. When you have gone through that together, it forms a bond. There is nothing quite like it.

Rowing also gives shape to everything outside the boat. You wake up at five or five-thirty, train, and then you know you will train again in the evening. That becomes the beginning and the end of your day. Everything else has to exist in between. For me, that middle is political philosophy. Most evenings I’m asleep by eight-thirty.

There is something from endurance sport that transfers into academic life. You work hard and, more importantly, you learn how to work hard. Rowing gives you a purpose every day. You know what you are building towards. You have a goal and you have to work towards it. I think the relationship between rowing and university is very symbiotic in that sense. You work hard for university and you work hard for rowing, and somehow each makes the other possible. Any stress you have can go into the sport. 

Fitness is what we spend so much time developing on the machine, but the art of rowing is technique, spirit and, above all, mentality. Against Cambridge we race for 6.8 kilometres. You can begin feeling the pain after 500 metres, and then you have to find a way through everything that remains. That is where the team becomes essential. You keep going because you know the guy behind you will keep going, and he keeps going because he knows the guy behind him will do the same. It becomes trust. Confidence. A mentality shared across the boat. 

Rowing is made of units. One stroke after another. Every two or three seconds, there is another decision to make. You have enough time to sit there and think: right, I have to do this again. Just one more. And then one more. If I keep doing that, eventually we will reach the end. And again, all of this creates human connections. At Oxford, you feel connected to the people who were recently in the club, but also to those who rowed there fifty or sixty years ago. They come back. They stand behind us. Eventually we will become part of that same heritage.

There is a visual culture attached to all of this too. In Britain, you see it particularly at Henley Royal Regatta. Style is a huge part of rowing, and I think there is something inherently stylish about the sport. There is something special happening when the style and tradition that come with rowing can coexist with opening the sport to more people. That visual identity is another way generations recognise one another. You see someone wearing your blazer somewhere in the world and immediately there is a connection. You belong to a community with a visual identity as well as a culture.

That community can become much larger than Oxford. Being in Turin, racing crews from across Europe, gives us something we rarely experience because normally we compete against British crews. Here, thanks to the support of Sebago, we can see rowing culture beyond Britain, meet people from elsewhere, exchange with them, then race them. Even rowing in mixed crews is unusual for us. At Oxford, the men and women are one club but normally train and race separately. Here, being in the same boat brings the club together differently. 

And then there is simply the Po river. It is beautiful. We train near Oxford and spend a lot of time in London because the Boat Race is there. London is busy. There are boats everywhere, waves, all that movement. Here there is greenery running along the sides of the water. You notice the difference.”

Matilde Paoletti | LUISS

“I first took up rowing through the Remare a Scuola programme. I was in middle school when my coaches recruited me: they had us try the rowing ergometer, selected the students who showed the most potential, and that was how I encountered the sport for the first time. Otherwise, I probably would never have had the chance to discover it. I immediately loved being outdoors, constantly surrounded by people my own age, and having the opportunity to keep testing myself. Then, day by day, I learned to appreciate it more and more. Now, essentially, my entire life revolves around it: I train twice a day, every day. On Sundays, only once.

My goal, ever since I was little, has been to reach the Olympics. I’m already part of the Italian Under-23 national team. At LUISS, we follow different paths: some athletes row directly with the university team, while I continue to train with my own club. My preparation is different because, during the summer, the goal is to earn a place on the national team and represent Italy in the Azzurri colours.

I believe every sport has its own form of art. Rowing perhaps even more so, because it takes place in such beautiful surroundings, outdoors and on the water, whether that means a lake, a river or the sea. But above all, it is a form of movement, of synchrony, and that in itself can become an artistic expression. Unlike many modern sports, rowing also has a tradition stretching back centuries. In Italy, it may not be as widespread as it is in countries such as the United States or England, where there is a strong collegiate culture, particularly around the larger boats such as the eight. But we have an important history of our own, especially in the smaller boats, and today we are also working to develop women’s rowing more and more.

I’m very proud to be a student-athlete. LUISS gives me a great deal of support along this path, particularly because I moved to northern Italy precisely so that I could devote myself fully to rowing. Finding a balance between these two dimensions is fundamental, and I believe sport is also an excellent way to learn how to organise yourself better academically and pursue a dual career at the same time.

A lot of people my age who don’t row tell me that exercising for an hour, perhaps two or three times a week, helps them switch off from the intensity of university life. That always makes me smile, because for me it is exactly the opposite. Since I train twice a day, studying has become the moment when I switch off from rowing. I’ve always enjoyed studying, so I also see the time I dedicate to law as a form of mental concentration, a way of keeping my mind trained. Having a day full of commitments actually helps me reconcile the two sides of my life.

Of course, there are sacrifices to be made. I wouldn’t call them things I have to give up, because this is something I choose to do willingly, but you can’t go to bed at eleven every night. I usually go to sleep around nine or nine-thirty and wake up early. I still manage to have a social life and, in fact, one of the most beautiful aspects of rowing is precisely the friendships it allows you to build. We rowers spend a lot of time together: we train alongside one another all day and, ultimately, most of my circle of friends belongs to this world.

For me, the perfect balance lies between mind and body. Talent matters, but it isn’t enough. What you need above all is consistency and training. Results may not come immediately, and you have to be willing to build towards them through a much longer process. International competitions are concentrated mainly in spring and summer, but most of the work happens during the winter. When someone watches a race, they see the two thousand metres, they see the effort and, if everything goes well, they see the victory. What they don’t see are all the kilometres behind it — sometimes as many as forty a day — together with the work in the gym and on the rowing ergometer. That is why, beyond the physical side, the mind is fundamental. 

And then you have to feel the boat. In the larger boats, like the eight, you need an extraordinary degree of synchrony with the entire crew. During the year, however, I’m primarily a single sculler, and I believe you have to develop a genuine feeling for the boat, to the point where you can almost correct yourself instinctively. First and foremost, I have to be my own toughest judge. Of course, I then speak to my coach, who can give me an external perspective, but by now I’ve learned to understand my body and to feel when something is working and when it isn’t.

Over the past few years, I’ve also started racing in mixed boats. It’s a discipline I really enjoy. Finding a common rhythm isn’t always easy: the men have longer levers than we do and are stronger, so synchronising the drive and the length of the stroke can be complicated. But there is a great atmosphere in the boat. This year I won bronze at the Under-23 European Championships in the mixed eight, and I hope this discipline continues to find a place in competition.

That is also why I enjoy being here in Turin. I discovered the city through rowing itself, competing over the years at various events. Here, I recognise so much of the historical tradition of our sport. There are different crews, people who row solely at university level and others who compete at an elite level, teams coming from very different backgrounds. There is an international atmosphere and, above all, a shared desire to test ourselves. I’m proud to represent LUISS here, particularly because the university enables me to continue along this path through the LUISS Top Athlete programme. 

I’m equally happy that an event organised by Sebago has chosen to shine a light on rowing, because ours is a sport that has yet to achieve its full visibility among a wider audience. I also really appreciate its aesthetic dimension: seeing all the crews training in the same kit creates an elegant image, one that feels closely connected to the style that belongs to this world. I hope there will be more events like this, capable of bringing greater visibility to our sport.”

Oscar Krause | University of Hamburg

“I think I fell in love with rowing more than once. The first time was when I was twelve. I wasn’t particularly good at football or the other sports that everyone seemed to play, and rowing simply became a place where I could be. Everyone was new to it at that age, and I happened to be good at it. It gave me somewhere I could test myself.

Then I fell in love with rowing for a second time, after taking a break from high-intensity training. That was when I realised that progress doesn’t always move forward. It isn’t a straight line upwards. If you want to improve, you really have to commit yourself to it. That changed what rowing meant to me. It was no longer simply a place where I could win medals. It became a place where I had to work hard and learn discipline.

I’ve always found rowing incredibly aesthetic. I used to watch rowing videos, and there is such a strong culture around rowing clubs: the clubhouses themselves, the people, everything surrounding them. Somehow, it gives you a kind of home. That aesthetic dimension makes you feel comfortable, appreciated, part of something larger than yourself. And, of course, when you are rowing in a boat with other people, you literally are part of something larger. From the outside, there is something extremely pleasing about watching a crew move together. But you can feel that same aesthetic quality from inside the boat as well: in the rhythm, in the stroke, in the length of the movement.

Rowing has definitely shaped my academic life. I wasn’t always the best student. I used to run away from my father when he wanted me to do my homework and go to the rowing club instead. Then I realised that if I wanted to become successful in rowing, I needed to attend a sports school… and to get there, I needed good grades. One began to push the other upwards. Without rowing, I don’t think I would have developed the same discipline academically. Rowing taught me patience. It taught me how to work towards something over a long period of time. Without the sport, and without the sports school I attended in northern Germany, I don’t think I would have come as far as I have.

It also keeps me grounded. There are moments when you simply cannot perform at your best, and having to confront that can be very grounding. Rowing is an incredibly demanding sport. During the hardest sessions, sometimes you simply have to bulldog your way through them. That mental strength eventually finds its way into everything else you do. Rowers have this reputation for being able to get through difficult periods, whether at work or while studying. As a student-athlete, of course, you don’t have as much free time as everyone else. But rowing is also what we consider our free time. It doesn’t feel like a job. It is simply part of the way our lives work.

For me, the individual side of rowing is just as important as the collective one. Even though it is a team sport, I think an individual rower can actually help the crew by being a little selfish. You have to want to become better than everyone else. Training is always, in some way, a race against the people around you. When everyone brings that mentality into the same environment, a dynamic develops in which everybody progresses. Of course, you cannot become too selfish. You need respect. You need to care about the people around you. But that balance is part of what makes a good rower.

Representing my university is different in Germany from what I imagine it might be like at a university in the United States. Rowing isn’t particularly popular, and many people at the university probably don’t even know that these competitions are taking place. But when you come to a race like this and compete alongside Oxford and other major universities, there is a certain sense of tradition to it. You represent where you come from, and that is a great honour. It makes you want to give your best. It is like having the wind at your back.

There is something about places like Turin that belongs naturally to rowing. I also row at a club in Switzerland that is very traditional and very old. There is this large clubhouse, with wood everywhere, medals and trophies accumulated over time. History seems to come together in places like that. Like rowing itself, there is something about them that is simply beautiful to look at. 

I really enjoy seeing a major brand like Sebago become involved in rowing because it gives another dimension to the sport. Rowing has always been quite niche. It has never really existed in the full spotlight. Sebago, as I’ve come to understand it, already belongs to a world connected to water, lakes, boats and the culture surrounding them, so I think there is something important about bringing that into the sporting dimension as well.

I have many friends in northern Germany who dress very well and carry that same kind of spirit with them. It becomes something larger than the sport itself. It becomes a lifestyle. I didn’t grow up in that kind of environment. I come from an area near Switzerland where rowing isn’t particularly big. But through rowing, sports school and university, I’ve gradually entered this world. Little by little, it has become more than a sport for me. It has become a culture.”