The
Sarasota Herald Tribune: 28 December 2002
MASTER
STROKE 
Six days a week you can find Jennifer
Bank gliding through the water in her royal blue scull on the Intracoastal
Waterway by Casey Key in south Sarasota County.
Dressed in her trademark white long-sleeve shirt, white baseball cap and bike
shorts, Bank walks through the damp grass barefoot, balancing the 30-pound boat
on her head before placing it in shallow water.
She prepares herself mentally for a workout of sprints and long strokes, looking
calm and collected while rowing back and forth through the water. All she needs
is a little solitude so she can focus on her technique.
"I love to row," the 63-year-old said. "It's addicting and
exhilarating."
No other sport quenches her desire like rowing. The 6-foot-tall Bank has always
had a passion for competition and sports. In fact, years ago she dreamed of
becoming an Olympic swimmer.
She has also excelled as an amateur tennis player and golfer, training and
coaching at various athletic clubs, while working as a biochemist.
It wasn't until five years ago that she discovered her rowing talent.
This past September, Bank represented the United States at the World Masters
Championship in Racice, Czech Republic. She placed first in the 1,000-meter
double and quad sculling race, winning two gold medals.
Her friends "said I could be a champion, but I didn't listen," Bank
said about her first year rowing with the Sarasota Scullers Club in 1997.
"It's empowering to do, and it's an individual thing to perfect. Other
sports give a different feeling, but I experience all those feelings through
rowing."
Finding
her niche
Bank, who lives most of the year in Boston, has been a part-time resident of
Sarasota for 10 years. She discovered Sarasota while traveling between the
University of Florida and the University of Miami while studying biology in the
mid-1970s and early '80s. This winter she plans to spend the majority of her
time training for the 2003 World Championships in France.
She started rowing after a friend suggested it as cross-training for her tennis
workout. Her athletic background helped make the learning process easy.
"I have a passion for it. When I have a passion for something I devote a
lot of time to it, a lot of effort," said Bank. "I've always had an
attachment to water. When I'm distracted and tired I come to the sea and get
regenerated again. I'm getting that through my training. It revitalizes
me."
Bank, who grew up surrounded by water on Long Island, is one of three children.
Her mother died when she was 17, so she and her brothers, Jack and Dick, had to
count on each other.
"It was just me, my brothers and the world. I always earned my way; it
toughened me up for competition," she said. "I competed with my
brothers, so it made me a little bit of a tomboy."
Bank has a daughter, April, who lives in California.
"My family thought I was crazy to start rowing now, but I don't think of
myself as old," Bank said. "I'm kind of an independent woman. I like
to move; I'm not one to just sit around and read a book."
Within a year of learning the basics of rowing, she began competing at regional
indoor competitions and earned the respect of former Olympic rowers in the
sporting community who also competed and attended the competitions.
She befriended Marlene Royle, who became her personal coach. Royle, who's
currently [rowing] in Israel, sends Bank her training workouts via e-mail.
"Their high level of athletics is inspiring," she said about learning
from established athletes. "It pushed me to the very highest level and I
realized that I was competitive with them. It gave me the strength to go the
extra inch to achieve at that high level."
Bank has been able to maintain her athletic lifestyle of training year-round
because of sponsorship provided by Sassy Salon in Sarasota, Warm Mineral Springs
in Punta Gorda, Sports Medicine & Rehabilitation International in Bradenton,
and the Berta Walker Gallery in the Boston area.
"It took me a while to understand the depth of commitment and the depth of
an athlete," said Walker, 61, about Bank, whom she met 10 years ago at an
art gallery in Boston. "The more I got to know her and talk to her, I was
impressed with her habit, that someone her age can do what she can do. She has
found her area of expertise."
Plenty
of support
Walker and her twin, Louise Davey, are Bank's closest friends and most avid
supporters.
"I brag about her, but she doesn't talk about herself," Walker said.
"She wants to help people and is always offering her strength; always
taking care of other people."
Davey has seen Bank compete on the Charles River in Boston and worked with her
in Sarasota doing investment real estate. She was so inspired by Bank's attitude
toward exercise and health that she purchased an indoor rowing machine and
started working out.
Bank has offered her services to the Frank Berlin Branch of the YMCA in
Sarasota, teaching rowing technique on the indoor machines and coaching private
rowing lessons. She's at the Y between 9:30 to 10:30 a.m. Mondays and
Wednesdays.
"It would be wonderful to have a class, but right now we don't have
room," said Marilee Young, the YMCA's assistant senior program coordinator.
"I watch people now and I know there's a technique, and it's so simple to
grasp."
Bank is the last person to admit that her achievements and gold medals are
significant. She's constantly striving to improve her performance and motivate
others.
"I love to see people and where I can benefit them," Bank said.
"The major thing is empowerment. They (students) become empowered. It's
liberating to be able to control and operate independently of the world."
Home
