- January 20, 2026
For the second year in a row, the Harvard Radcliffe women’s rowing club has taken up residence at the Palm Coast Rowing Club.
Palm Coast Rowing Club President Mark Heacock said the Harvard & Radcliffe team comes down once a year in the winter to practice ahead of the competitive season in spring. At this point, he said, the water up north is either too cold or too solid for the teams to practice on.
“It's awful cold in Cambridge,” Heacock said, “so they come down here to get some actual liquid water to row in and try to get a head start on their season.”
The Harvard & Radcliffe team will finish their practice camp and head home on Jan. 24, but it is not the only team that comes south for the practice. Many northern universities send their teams south in the winter to practice, Heacock said, including the Syracuse University’s women’s rowing team.
Syracuse’s team has been practicing in Flagler County’s stretch of the Intracoastal Waterway for at least the last five years, Heacock said. The team just finished their Florida camp on Jan. 10, according to Syracuse women’s rowing team social media.
The Palm Coast Rowing Club has been in operation for over a decade and has a variety of youth, adult and indoor rowing programs people can take part in.
The groups set up their rowing practices typically three days a week, Heacock said, on Saturdays, Mondays and Wednesdays, with the Monday rows reserved for the adult program. The indoor rowing exercise program is held weekly at the Palm Coast Community Center on indoor rowing machines.
Heacock has been rowing since high school in Northern Virginia, and continued to row while attending the University of Virginia.
“It's a great sport. It can be done your entire life,” he said. “We have people in our club who are in their late 70s, and we've had some in their 80s, actually, row.”
When the college teams come down for their practice camps, Heacock said the Palm Coast Rowing Club hosts the teams at their local boat yard, but gives the teams a wide berth to let them practice. The college competitive season begins in the spring, he said, and lasts all through summer.
Being on the water gives the students experience that they can’t get from just rowing inside, he said. On the Intracoastal, the students can experience a variety of conditions: the wind, the cold, waves, flat water, sunny days.
“It's a very serious development time for them, where they get a chance to be on the water and row in the boats, and that's a great advantage for their competitions later,” he said. “Nothing beats actually being out on the water.”
The Harvard team coaches could not be reached in time for this publication.
