Zeeman ready to row in first Olympic Games

While many Olympians start their sport at an early age, Carling Zeeman, born in Marken the Netherlands, is still fairly new to her craft.

“I saw a ‘learn to row’ sign when I went to my first day of university,” said the 25-year-old. “And I thought, ‘why not?’ I dragged along some of my classmates. It looked like a good time. I ended up getting a lot of friends there and I stuck with it.”

While Zeeman was athletic growing up, playing volleyball, running track and speed skating, she had never rowed until 2009 at Sudbury’s Laurentian University. Now, seven years after hitting the water for the first time, the Cambridge, Ontario native is preparing for her first Olympic Games.

For Zeeman, it was her early struggles in the sport that made her want to keep going.

“My first year, I did it purely for social reasons. My classmates came out with me and I made a lot of friends and it just became a social thing. We would just go there after a night out and drag our butts to practice. I had come from a couple of different sports where I was used to excelling and winning. When I first got into the singles in 2010, I did not win at all. I was actually last almost every single race and it irritated me. That kind of lit the fire for me.”