Skimming
the surface to success
By Matt Herb
Special to the Post-Dispatch
Monday, Jan. 17 2005
Andrew Goldstein
isn't a typical high school athlete. Typical high school athletes don't have ergs in the
basement.
A metal rail with a retractable handlebar at one end and a seat at the other,
the erg - it's short for ergometer - is the closest you can get to rowing without
actually dipping an oar in the water. It's
also the closest you can get to medieval torture without having been born
in the seventh century.
"Rowing on a machine is different from rowing outside," says Goldstein,
co-captain of the St. Louis Rowing Club's varsity men's team. "It takes a lot
out of you."
That being the case, the erg doesn't rank with the iPod on teenage America's
collective wish list.
"Most kids probably would want to get away from it," says Julie Goldstein,
Andrew's mother.
Most, but not all. Unsatisfied with working out on the club's equipment, Andrew
Goldstein received an erg as a gift from his father, Gary, and Julie. It sits
in the basement of their Chesterfield home, where it has helped shape Andrew, a
senior at Mary Institute Country Day School, into a top rower.
Last year he was named the rowing club's MVP and was the winner of its Golden
Hammer Award, which goes to the rower with the best erg score. He was also on a
double that competed at the prestigious Royal Canadian Henley Regatta in St.
Catharines, Ontario. In 2003 he was the youngest member of a four-man team that competed
at the Head of the Charles Regatta in Boston.
Those accomplishments are a testament to Goldstein's workaholic demeanor. "It's not
that he has great natural ability," says John Wetzstein, his coach at the
rowing club. "He's just really, really driven to improve."
Goldstein's devotion is all the more remarkable given what he has had to
overcome along the way. He isn't just an athletic success story; he also is a
diabetic.
In the beginning
When Goldstein was 5 years old, his mother noticed that he had developed an
unquenchable thirst. No matter how much he drank, it wasn't enough. A preschool
teacher noticed it, too. She was continually emptying the wastebasket after he
filled it with paper cups.
The diagnosis was life-changing. Type 1 diabetes prevents the body from
producing insulin, the hormone that transports sugar - energy - from the blood to
the cells. It can attack the heart, the eyes, the nerves, kidneys and blood
vessels. The Goldsteins were frightened.
"It was overwhelming at first," Julie Goldstein says. But with careful
monitoring of blood sugar and daily insulin injections, diabetes can be controlled.
From the start, Andrew was diligent about doing that. Within a year
of the diagnosis, he was administering his own insulin shots.
A two-edged sword
Exercise can play a role in controlling diabetes, but it poses hazards as well.
Bursts of physical activity can deplete the body's supply of sugar, which can
bring on dizziness and fatigue. Goldstein
carries glucose tablets with him in case his blood sugar drops, and
he has spoken at length to Wetzstein about what to do in case of an emergency.
Once while practicing he did "get low," and began to feel lightheaded.
But the boat's coxswain was prepared. She
handed him his sugar pills, and after resting for
a few minutes, he continued.
"It really hasn't hindered my fitness," Goldstein says. "As long as I do
all the extra steps, I can train just like
anyone else and I can compete like anyone else."
Discovering a passion
Goldstein has only been rowing for a few years. His first love was basketball,
and he also played on the water polo team at MICDS. On a lark, he tried rowing as a freshman. Right away, he was captivated.
"It was so
unlike any other sport," he said. "You have to come to the boathouse
and take out a boat, take out a single or a double or a boat with seven other
people and go out on the water. The tranquillity of working on your fitness,
it's just unexplainable. It's a great feeling and a perfect fit for me."
After a year on the novice team, Goldstein was named the club's most improved
athlete in his second year. "He was very conscientious during workouts, always
very attentive," Wetzstein says. "He would talk to me after each
practice."
Goldstein was recruited by a number of colleges in the Northeast, where rowing enjoys a
higher profile than in the Midwest. Dartmouth pursued him. So did Cornell, Brown and
Columbia. But he passed up the Ivy League in favor of Bates College, a Division III school
hidden away in the leafy seclusion of southern Maine.
"It isn't as intense as Division I," admits Goldstein, who is planning a career
in science or medicine. "But that's partly by choice. I had the option of
rowing in Division I. But I want a balance between athletics and academics. I
don't want my athletics to completely overtake my college experience."
He will begin his college rowing career next fall.
A hidden gem
In the meantime, he hopes to see his sport gain a stronger foothold in St. Louis. The
men's varsity team on the rowing club has only six rowers this
winter, as membership has declined from previous seasons. The club is open to
high school athletes from all over the region, but not every school is as
accommodating as MICDS, which allows students to use rowing as a way to fulfill
the athletic requirement in the school's curriculum. "And I can understand that," Wetzstein says. "They want those athletes for their
own teams."
The sport's demanding nature also makes recruiting difficult. The erg isn't an
easy sell. Winters are spent mostly in the boathouse - practicing moves indoors
when the combined water and air temperature dips below 100 degrees - and
summers are for early risers, with weekday workouts beginning at 6 a.m., when
the water is most placid.
"It takes a pretty unique breed," Wetzstein says. "Rowing is second only to
cross-country skiing in its cardiovascular (demands). There's a lot of
repetition. You get out of it what you put in."
"I've become very disciplined in my fitness," he says. "Rowing has given me
the confidence that I can achieve things that
I hadn't dreamed I could. I've become very
involved with not only the nutrition to keep my diabetic levels stable,
but to make me a better athlete, too. I just want to succeed."
NAME: Andrew Goldstein
AGE: 18
HOME: Chesterfield
OCCUPATION: Student
WHAT HE DID: Overcame Type 1 diabetes to become one of the top rowers in the region. Named
MVP of the St. Louis Rowing Club last year, Goldstein has competed at the Head of the
Charles and Royal Canadian Henley regattas.
QUOTABLE: "I've worked very hard to get where I am today, to be able to enter
into college rowing. Once I get there, I hope to exceed myself and see where it takes me."
For more information:
The St. Louis Rowing Club has a juniors program for high school students from
the St. Louis area. It is also open to adults, with Learn to Row classes for
newcomers to the sport.
Established in 1875, the club trains out of the Community Rowing Center at
Creve Coeur Lake. For more information, visit the club's Web site,
www.slrc.net, or call 314-434-8299.