In my very first year at Cambridge, when I had just learned how to row for my college, I went to see the Boat Races. And as the boats lined up for the starting line, I thought to myself, “they must be so nervous, the pressure, all the months of work they put in, and now is the moment that decided whether it was worth it or not.”
A year later, I sat on the same starting line and was completely calm.
As a crew, we spent the week before the race on site. And I started to become nervous with the big day approaching. But I still remember my crew getting together in a huddle the morning of the race before going out for a last paddle. And at that moment, the nervousness just vanished, and I was calm.
A simple realization that washed out the nervousness was that I had done all I could. I had put in all the hard work over the last months to be the best version of myself I could be that day. And I was part of a group of women who had all done the same. We could not make the other boat go slower; we could only make our boat go faster. So there was no use worrying about Oxford, and we knew we were ready.
We ended up winning decisively.
Dr. Eva-Maria Hempe 