SUNDAY, NOVEMBER 7
Head of the Lake Regatta
Montlake Cut / Seattle, Wash. / 8:00 a.m.
     • Raceday Results -- https://www.regattacentral.com/regatta/results2/?job_id=6566&org_id=0
 
SEATTLE – The highlight of the fall rowing season takes place on Sunday for the Seattle Pacific women's rowing team.
 
Two crews with white Falcon logos on their maroon blades will row November 7 in the Head of the Lake Regatta. The 41st-annual event begins at 8:00 a.m. Pacific Standard Time. The complete field features 454 boats in 42 different categories, several of them with multiple flights.
 
The course starts in Lake Union and travels through the Montlake Cut before ending in Union Bay near the UW's Conibear Shellhouse.
 
Last year's Head of the Lake event was cancelled due to the COVID outbreak.
 
THE FIELD
The women's championship eight race, sponsored by Pocock Racing Shells, starts at 8:06 a.m. That event features a nine-boat field that includes the SPU varsity eight directed by LeeAnn Arrington. Also competing are two eight-oared crews each from Gonzaga and host Washington along with single boats from Portland, Puget Sound, Oregon and Seattle University.
 
The Falcons varsity four rows at 8:11 a.m. in an exhibition capacity. Their second varsity eight was unable to compete so coxswain Moxie McCandless and a quartet of rowers from the boat will participate as a four-oared crew. They will be rowing in the same grouping as the Collegiate JV-8 field, including eight-oared entries from Gonzaga, Portland, Seattle University and Washington.
 
WHAT IS HEAD RACING?
Instead of the traditional Olympic-style racing format, with boats lining up side-to-side on a 2,000-meter course, this is a head race covering a three-mile distance.
 
Head races are time trials, processional events that start with boats in a single-file line with a rolling start at intervals between 10 and 20 seconds. Passing is allowed and the order of finish is determined by each crews' elapsed time from start to finish.
 
THE COURSE
The 5,000-meter (3.1 mile) course starts in Lake Union at the College Club boathouse with Seattle's iconic Space Needle in view. Rowers wind beneath the University Bridge into Portage Bay and through the Montlake Cut to Lake Washington where the course takes a sharp turn back toward Husky Stadium to the finish line 200 meters from the entrance to Conibear Shellhouse at the University of Washington.
 
AVALON TARBET-MENDOZA INTERVIEW

2019 HEAD OF THE LAKE RECAP
Seattle Pacific placed third in the featured women's race on October 3, 2019, trailing only two crews from event host University of Washington at the 40th-annual Head of the Lake Regatta. Two other Falcons crews competed with their No. 2 boat racing to a runner-up result in the women's second varsity eight competition. That race was also won by a Husky crew.
 
SPU's third entry, comprised of seven novice competitors along with one experienced rower and a veteran coxswain, made its maiden voyage. The Falcons finished sixth in the race for third varsity crews.
 
For the second straight year Seattle Pacific's top crew was the leading non-NCAA Division I finisher in the collegiate races. The Division II Falcons clocked a time of 18-minutes, 8.99-seconds in the championship eight event.
 
 

MEET COACH McCLAIN
Caitlin McClain begins her second season at the helm of the Seattle Pacific rowing program after guiding the team to a No. 2 national ranking in her inaugural campaign. The former Loyola Marymount standout, who served 15 years at the helm of the Holy Names Academy program, was hired on Aug. 8, 2021 as the Falcons head coach. McClain remains in Seattle where she has resided since 2005 while working at her alma mater, Holy Names Academy, from where she graduated in 2001. She boasts a wealth of rowing experience to SPU, including competitive stints at HNA and Loyola Marymount along with national coaching duties with USRowing.
 
During the summer, McClain served in the role of women's lead coach for the 2021 Under-19 National Team, which competed in August at the World Rowing Junior Championships in Bulgaria. She previously served as an assistant coach for the Under-19 women's national team in 2014 and then was promoted to CanAmMex coach in 2016 and the junior world championships coach in 2019.
 
A 2005 Loyola Marymount graduate with bachelor's degrees in political science and urban studies, McClain continued her education at Seattle University to complete a master's of education in student development administration in 2010.
 
McClain built a regional high school rowing power and made Holy Names a major player at the national level. Her Cougars crews accumulated 10 medals and won national championships in 2015 and 2017 at the junior club regatta. She coached three rowers and two coxswains who went on to make World Rowing Junior Championships squads.
 
McClain replaced Andrew Derrick, who served four seasons from 2017 through 2020.
 
NEXT REGATTA
The Head of the Lake is the official final event on the fall racing calendar, but the Falcons may compete in a scrimmage against some local college crews.
 
The primary collegiate rowing season is in the spring and the Falcons will announce that schedule when it is finalized.
 
HEAD OF THE LAKE REGATTA
Sunday, November 7, 2021
Montlake Cut / Seattle, Wash.
5,000-meter course (3.1 miles)
 
8:08 a.m.
Championship Women's Eight (Sponsored by Pocock Racing Shells)
Start Order
1 - Washington "A"
2 - Washington "B"
3 - Seattle Pacific
4 - Portland
5 - Seattle University
6 - Oregon
7 - Gonzaga "A"
8 - Puget Sound
9 - Gonzaga "B"
 
SPU Varsity Eight lineup
cox – LeeAnn Arrington (Sr./Empire, OK/Empire HS)
stroke – Jacinta Grandel (Jr./Palmer, AK/Rosary HS)
7 – Macie Leach (Jr./Chico, CA/Pleasant Valley HS)
6 – Elise Arkills (So./Tacoma, WA/Curtis HS)
5 – Hannah Miller (So./East Lyme, CT/East Lyme)
4 – Danielle Johnson (Sr./Mill Creek, WA/Jackson HS)
3 – Kalais Samuelson (Jr./Beaverton, OR/Sunset HS)
2 – Jennifer Hoag (Sr./Normandy Park, WA/Seattle Christian HS)
bow – Avalon Tarbet-Mendoza (Sr./Vancouver, WA/Columbia River)
 
 
8:11 a.m.
Women's Collegiate JV Eight
Start Order
1 - Washington
2 - Seattle Pacific (four)
3 - Portland
4 - Gonazga
5 - Seattle University
 
SPU Varsity Four Lineup
cox – Moxie McCandless (Jr./Albuquerque, NM/Albuquerque Academy HS)
stroke – Megan Popielak (So./Petaluma, CA/Petaluma HS)
3 – Victoria Brohard (Fr./Puyallup, WA/Puyallup HS)
2 – Nicole Svoboda (Jr./La Quinta, CA/La Quinta HS)
bow – Sophie Sandahl (Jr./Coupeville, WA/Oak Harbor HS/Skagit Valley CC)