Rowing Welcomes Pink Ribbon Crew for Home Weekend

EAST LANSING, Mich. -- This weekend, Michigan State is set to team up with the local Pink Ribbon Crew for a Breast Cancer Awareness regatta at Grand River Park on Saturday, October 27. Michigan State's varsity and novice squads will take to the water at 4:00 p.m. with races against Wisconsin, Michigan and Eastern Michigan prior to the start of the breast cancer awareness event at approximately 6:00 p.m.

This will be the first collegiate rowing experience for many members of Michigan State's novice crew.

"The team has been working on making technical and racing advances throughout the fall and I am looking forward to seeing them execute these changes against Wisconsin and Eastern Michigan this weekend," said MSU head coach Matt Weise. "It is also the first race for our novice team. They have been performing well in practice and I hope to see the same execution on race day."

The Pink Ribbon Crew is a local rowing crew consisting of breast cancer survivors. Donations will be accepted at the parking lot with the proceeds going towards mammograms for underprivileged women through the Deborah L. and Michael G. Harrison Mammography Endowment at the Sparrow Foundation.

"This is a very symbolic weekend," said member of the Pink Ribbon Crew, Les Algren. "Matt Weise, our current head coach, wrote the initial proposal to create the MSU Women's Rowing team, and Wisconsin head coach Bebe Bryans was the first head coach at MSU, so, for Wisconsin to come here elicits memories from the beginning years of our program."

In August 2002, the Pink Ribbon Crew was established as the first rowing program formed with the purpose of teaching breast cancer survivors how to row.

"Stacey Rippetoe was an assistant coach at the time, and she is the one who created the Lansing WeCanRow chapter," said Algren.

WeCanRow is a rowing program for women who have overcome breast cancer and Lansing WeCanRow was the first satellite chapter of the program.

Algren quickly found that rowing has given her renewed trust in her body. "Our group learns to row, and in the process, it creates physical activity and helps us to regain trust in our bodies," said Algren. "Our bodies betrayed us by giving us breast cancer. Post-menopausal breast cancer survivors that maintain routine exercise have been proven to have fewer recurrences of their cancer!"

At 6:00 p.m. all breast cancer survivors are invited to learn about rowing and the Pink Ribbon Crew. The informative meeting and training session is only open to breast cancer survivors.

"It is my wish that breast cancer survivors and supporters join us on Saturday afternoon to raise money for the Sparrow Foundation and for those more daring, to join our Pink Ribbon Crew," said Weise. "The members of the Pink Ribbon Crew are inspiring to the athletes and staff and provide great camaraderie for each other on and off the water."

Michigan State University Athletics

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