How Kristen Siermachesky jumped from SU ice hockey to Canada’s rowing system in 1 year

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Kristen Siermachesky had never competed in a single scull race. A few days before the Burnaby Lake Small Boat Invitational, an independent race she entered in Canada, Siermanchesky’s coach, Terry Paul, had to teach her how to flawlessly stop and turn the boat, approaching a buoy 2,000 meters into the race — something she also hadn’t done.

But Siermachesky, who’s only been rowing for just over a year, finished second out of approximately 60 athletes, Paul said.

“She picked up (turning) pretty quick and sure enough she did really well,” Paul said.

Siermachesky played four years of ice hockey at Syracuse as a defenseman, notching 132 blocks in 125 appearances for the Orange from 2017-2021. Upon finishing her undergraduate degree at SU, she explored playing professional hockey overseas, but ultimately decided on pursuing a graduate degree in sports administration at North Carolina. But at the time, Siermachesky wasn’t ready for her athletic career to be over.

There was one problem — North Carolina doesn’t have an ice hockey program.

“I needed to go to North Carolina, but I wasn’t ready to give up the sports world,” Siermachesky said. “And of course, they didn’t have hockey there, but I’ve been playing hockey for so long that I was kind of like, ‘you know what, let’s try something new.’”

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Then-Syracuse ice hockey head coach Paul Flanagan gave Siermachesky the idea to explore rowing. Soon after, Siermachesky contacted Tar Heels’ newly hired rowing head coach, Erin Neppel.

Despite having never stepped into a boat upon arriving at Chapel Hill, Siermachesky’s ice hockey background, athletic build, toughness, and desire to become a great rower helped her adjust to the new sport, though it took time for her to fully develop the technique.

“Probably for the whole first semester, she was pretty rough,” Neppel said. “She wanted to go really, really hard so some of the finer nuanced stuff was a little bit longer coming.”

Neppel said she knew of Siermachesky’s potential when she helped win seat races on the top boats. Regardless of the boat’s lineup, she had a positive impact despite her technique not being polished, Neppel said.

While Siermachesky’s technique was still a work in progress, her test results and metrics on the erg were elite. In her one season with the Tar Heels, she competed in nine races at the first varsity eight and was named the Atlantic Coast Conference’s Newcomer of the Year. At the ACC Championships, her first varsity eight boat finished first in the Petite Final.

As a result of her desire to see how far she could take rowing, Neppel knew “she had something” in Siermachesky, so she tried getting her hooked into the Canadian rowing system.

At the beginning of the 2022 spring season, Neppel brought Chuck McDiarmid — a NextGen Program Lead at Rowing Canada Aviron — in from Canada to observe Siermachesky practice and help refine her technique.

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Everything started to click for Siermachesky once she started working closely with McDiarmid and the rest of the UNC coaching staff. Siermachesky grew exponentially by diligently watching more videos, trying new techniques in the water, observing her teammates and staying coachable.

Yet, despite stringing together a few strokes that really impressed the coaching staff early in the season, Siermachesky was unable to sustain her refined performances over a long period of time.

But as she continued to practice, those few strokes became more and more frequent. Siermachesky eventually won the Petite Final ACC Championship and Newcomer of the Year award.

Halfway through her time at UNC, Siermachesky received a call from the Team Canada Development Team, asking her to move to British Columbia as soon as possible to train with the national team. She finished the rowing season at UNC with one goal in mind — to make the Canadian National Rowing Team for the 2024 Olympics in Paris, France.

To better grasp a feel of Olympic competition, Siermachesky got into contact with Kasia Gruchalla-Wesierski, a 2020 gold medalist and a member of the women’s eight on the Canadian National Rowing Team, as soon as she began training in British Columbia. The pair immediately clicked as they had similar backgrounds — like Siermachesky, Gruchalla-Wesierski started rowing in her early 20s, having previously played a different sport (skiing).

“(Siermachesky) got into (rowing) at the age of 22 and I started when I was 23. There’s a few of us on the National Team in our late twenties and now we get to call ourselves Olympians,” Gruchalla-Wesierski said. “It’s definitely a different route to being an (Olympic) athlete, but it’s totally possible.”

Gruchalla-Wesierski took Siermachesky under her wing as a mentor. She introduced Siermachesky to Paul, her current coach. Paul was a 1992 Olympic gold medalist in the Coxed Eights and had coached within the Canadian National Rowing Team system since 1995. He previously coached Gruchalla-Wesierski. The trio got dinner one night in August and Paul was immediately impressed with Siermachesky.

“(Siermachesky) seemed super, super keen, really enthusiastic, she’s obviously a good athlete, and just had a great attitude,” Paul said. “She really made it easy for me to create a situation where I can help her.”

Shortly after, Paul became Siermachesky’s coach and the two started training six days a week. Siermachesky typically has 12-14 sessions on the water, fine-tuning her technique while also spending hours in the gym on rowing machines or lifting weights.

Siermachesky was also selected into the RBC Training Group, a talent identification and athlete funding program designed to find young athletes with Olympic potential and provide them with the resources to achieve Olympic success.

Out of 1,500 athletes who competed in the spring, only 100 advanced to the final round in November. Of the final 100 athletes, 30, including Siermachesky, were named RBC Future Olympians — a huge help towards funding Siermachesky’s Olympic goals.

“I have great coaches and teammates supporting me and I have a lot of mentors in British Columbia that have taught me so much and have (taken me) under their wings,” Siermachesky said. “Continuing to follow that pathway and also make my own path… with the main goal of it being rowing and hopefully Paris 2024.”