Courtesy photos Coalport’s Anna Fowler gives making her college’s Division I rowing team as a walk-on a big thumbs-up.

Less than a month into her first semester at the University of Connecticut last fall, Anna Fowler saw the poster outside her dorm room.

“My roommate and my friend were talking about it. They were like, ‘Let’s do this,'” Fowler recalled. “So I was like, ‘OK. What’s the worst they can do?'”

Well, they can get you up at 4 a.m. to practice, for starters. But Fowler, Glendale High School softball’s all-time home run hitter, still decided it was worth her while to turn in her bat for an oar and join UConn’s women’s rowing team as a walk-on.

Fowler just completed her freshman season with the Huskies, sitting in the two position in the fourth varsity eight-plus boat at the 44th annual Eastern Sprints in Worcester, Mass. on April 30.

“That has all the Ivy League schools in it, so we thought we really were in for a show. But we ended up placing second,” Fowler said.

It’s been a long, hard, winding journey for a young woman who didn’t know anything about the sport 12 months ago when she was sitting in a classroom which literally overlooked Lake Glendale in northern Cambria County near the Clearfield County line. Huskies coach Jennifer Wendry, who just completed her 20th year at the helm, said Fowler has been a welcome addition to her team, though.

“She’s a good teammate, and we look at that more than anything. She fits that mold. She’s very supportive of her teammates, and she has that work ethic,” Wendry said of the 19-year-old speech, language, hearing and science major from Coalport. “When walk-ons become successful, it’s typically when they’ve had success in other sports in high school.”

Fowler definitely had that, being named a second-team Altoona Mirror softball all-star for the Lady Vikings as both a junior and a senior at Glendale. She also played varsity basketball for four years as a 5-foot-8 guard-forward and was a cheerleader.

Fowler’s athletic ability stood out to even her most-accomplished teammates, like Husky captain Arielle Sherman. Sherman was put in a group with Fowler during winter workouts and quickly took note this walk-on had something with which to work.

“I don’t want to say she’s ‘silent-but-deadly,’ but, it’s one of those things while she’s very quiet, when she competes in team competition, she usually wins every single thing. She’s like amazing,” Sherman said. “I was really thankful to have her on my team.”

While Fowler has had her bright moments, it’s certainly been a challenge, too. Here she was, a 7-hour drive from home, getting thrown into a Division I program after attracting minimal college recruiting despite her accomplishments on the softball diamond, practicing 20 hours per week while adjusting to campus life, balancing her studies with sessions on the dreaded ergometer: the rowing machine, called an “erg” for short — ‘That’s when we thought, ‘Oh, what did we get ourselves into?'”

“Practice starts at 4:15 or 5:15 (a.m.) every day,” Fowler said with a chuckle. “That’s the hard part. It’s pitch black, and you have to unload the boat, and walk them in the water and the whole time, you’re like, ‘Oh, gosh, I hope I don’t fall in.'”

Fowler survived that after making it through a couple of rounds of walk-on tryouts that included a 2-mile run, pushups, situps and swimming exercises that included treading water for 15 minutes. Partway into the fall semester, Fowler became very sick, experiencing migraines and throwing up every day.

“They didn’t know what was wrong. They thought it might be meningitis. Couldn’t figure it out. It was so painful. They finally realized I just had a super-pulled muscle in my back. It was triggering this awful pain,” Fowler said. “I missed about a month. That was a huge setback for me, because all the other girls that walked on, they were doing techniques. When I was cleared to come back, I felt like I missed out on a huge part. But I feel like I am slowly catching back up.”

Wendry said another challenge Fowler faced is that she’s actually a little short for a competitive rower. Fowler’s mindset and combination of physical and mental toughness has helped her clear those hurdles.

“She’s very coachable,” Wendry said.

According to Wendry, about half her team is made up of women who joined without a rowing background. Of course, Fowler isn’t the first area athlete to follow this path: Everett’s Natalie (Dell) O’Brien took up rowing at Penn State and wound up with a bronze medal from the 2012 Olympics.

“My goal from day one was to get faster, and I think most athletes trying something new can relate to that,” O’Brien said. “You’re drawn to the challenge, to peeling back the onion one more layer, to seeing if you can get one more second or inch, that’s what makes it fun. Getting more speed and building more power was my north star through college, post-college, the national team and then eventually, the Olympic team.”

Fowler’s goals are modest right now. She’d like to see if she can improve enough to possibly earn some scholarship money eventually, something only a select few can achieve at this level. Just being part of a program this big carries some status already when she talks to people back home, though.

“They were shocked. They were like ‘Oh, DI athlete,'” Fowler, who originally decided to go to UConn because her grandparents live nearby, said in a mock voice.

Her first race was a learning experience.

“I was so nervous. It was super windy,” Fowler said. “We were at the start line, and we had to keep the boat still, which was nearly impossible because of the wind. Once we started we settled in, but, while we practiced (2 kilometers) before, it’s different in a boat because you don’t know how to pace yourself.”

Fowler said rowing is a lot different from the sports she grew up playing.

“It’s different from softball and basketball where you can take breaks and really get in your head and think we have to come up clutch and get this hit or we have to make this basket to win,” Fowler said. “This is, as soon as you start, you have to go all out without stopping, because, if you let up on one stroke, that could be the stroke that loses you the race.”

Fowler admitted there’ve been times where she wondered if rowing was for her. Now, she seems eager to see where the river — or in some cases the lake — takes her.

“I don’t even care what boat I’m in,” Fowler said, “because, just as long as I’m out there, it’s nice.”

Courtesy photos
Coalport’s Anna Fowler gives making her college’s Division I rowing team as a walk-on a big thumbs-up.

Before they even row, Fowler and her teammates have to pack and carry their boats to the water.