Rights Holder Spotlight, Sarah McAuliffe, USRowing

RIGHTS HOLDER SPOTLIGHT

Sarah McAuliffe, USRowing

What circumstances led you to begin working at the United States Rowing Association?

I walked on to the Women’s Rowing team at University of Tennessee – Knoxville and fell in love with the sport. My undergraduate and graduate degree at UT is in sport management and I quickly fell in love with the business side of sport.

After I graduated, I got a job managing regattas at a well-known regatta venue in Oak Ridge, TN, where I was able to learn event management, volunteer management, communication skills, and how to really connect with people because I was a one stop shop!

After staying there for 6 years and developing many relationships with people in the rowing world, I was eager to apply to the USRowing role when it opened. Fast forward, and I’ve now been at USRowing for five years and incredibly proud to be part of the development of the sport and the Olympic movement.

What was the first thing you did when you learned you got the job?

Honestly, I jumped for joy and treated myself to an ice cream! It was truly a dream come true. After that, I went into logistics mode to figure out my move from Tennessee to Philadelphia. The beauty of working in event management is I thrive off project management.

Tell us about the United States Rowing Association line up of events and where they take place.

Depending on the year, USRowing owns and hosts 15+ domestic regattas and 5+ high performance events. We cater to youth, collegiate, post-collegiate, masters, and high-performance athletes, and host tens of thousands of spectators from all walks of life at our events.

We generally host one youth and one masters regatta within each region per year, and then three National Championships per year.

Our largest event is the USRowing Youth National Championships, which has been housed at Nathan Benderson Park in Sarasota, FL for the past couple of years. This event is the culmination of over 4,000 high school athletes' spring seasons, the graduation for hundreds of student-athletes, and guarantees an electric environment with over 10,000 people in attendance.

USRowing’s RowFest National Championships is an 8-day event that crowns national champions in all age categories and prioritizes celebrating all disciplines of this sport every July. This event connects the USRowing membership to the community by celebrating the sport with local vendors, brewery happy hours, locally planned events and more. In 2025, we will host this regatta at Ann Arbor-Ypsilanti, MI at Ford Lake Park.

The inaugural USRowing Youth Beach Sprint National Championships will be taking place at South Lido Key Beach in Sarasota, Fla. In June 2025. Beach Sprints have been announced as an Olympic event (for the first time) in LA2028, so we’re excited to provide the youth rowing audience with the opportunity to dive into the rowing discipline. Picture rowing, but add waves, some sprinting on the beach, and a party-like atmosphere!

All this work takes a village. Between my team, additional USRowing departments, our referee corps, our Coaches Councils, our venue partners, board of directors, and more are the reason we can host the quantity and quality of events that we do.

Describe why United States Rowing Association events are so meaningful to you.

I’m lucky enough to wake up every day and work to create a sporting experience that our membership will never forget for the rest of their lives. Working for an NGB, I get to have a direct impact in showing more people the sport that I love so much.

I’ve seen athletes cry happy tears with their fellow high school seniors after hitting their goal for the season at our events. I’ve also watched masters’ athletes join the sport for the first time in their 80’s and find community, meaning, and a great workout.

Every detail of an event is an opportunity to make it memorable for our members and I really look forward to providing those special moments.

Sarah, during the Sunshine Sports Council’s 2025 Innovation Think Tank, there was a buzz among the conference attendees recognizing the enthusiasm you bring to USRowing. In what ways has your passion led to increasing the overall experience for all United States Rowing Association athletes, coaches, and spectators?

I really believe “great things are done by a series of small things brought together”. I like to think that I bring enthusiasm about the importance of the small details and knowing we have to get those right, whether it’s to my team or to the overall organization.

Other event managers will know what I’m talking about, but I always joke that we absolutely must nail the parking experience at an event. How organized is it? Do we have friendly people assisting our members? What’s the value add our customers get when they are in the parking lot? If it goes according to plan, then we have members who start off on the right foot and with a positive experience. It sets us up for the rest of the event to continue to build the blocks to the overall experience.

The parking attendant's enthusiasm may seem like a “small thing”, but that experience will be a building block to a member's experience and it’s our choice to make it a positive or a negative.

What were the biggest reasons for these changes and how did they work to your advantage?

At the end of the day, everyone just wants to feel appreciated, noticed, and heard. Coaches, athletes, spectators etc. want to feel a personal touch and not like they’re one of the thousands that’s part of the bigger product. These small gestures help with that.

What was the most significant moment you experienced thus far as United States Rowing Association’s Director of Competition?

Every regatta/workday at USRowing has jaw dropping moments, but at the 2023 USRowing Youth National Championships it was our first year of having 10,000+ people on site at one time, and racing 8-lanes across for a 2,000-meter race at Nathan Benderson Park in Sarasota, Fla. I was standing on the balcony of the finish tower watching 8 boats wide come down the course and 10,000+ people screaming for their team to win. All 8 boats ended up finishing within 2 seconds of each other and required photo finish technology to determine placements. The buzz in the venue mixed with the emotion of it being most of the athletes last high school race was a feeling I’ll never forget.

In what way, or ways, are you a different person today because of your experience working at the United States Rowing Association for the past 5 years?

I’ve been lucky enough to meet many industry professionals and attend conferences filled with top notch speakers (like the Sunshine Sports Council’s Think Tank!) that continue to challenge my thinking and process for doing things daily. I’m constantly reaching out to people in the sports/tourism world who are experts in their fields and trying to soak it all up.

What advice would you give to others who find themselves in a situation like yours?

Things are always going to go wrong, but it’s important to be solution driven and not get too caught up in the emotions of something not going according to plan. While overseeing all USRowing’s owned events there is a personal pressure I put on myself to ensure they go well, but all I can do is strive to make things better with data-backed decisions.

I have a great team to help support tough decisions and we try to prepare for as many possible scenarios that may impact our day including weather, safety, and health of our athletes.

What would “today Sarah” share with “first day on the job Sarah?”

Relationships are everything! My favorite part of this job is finding creative solutions and pushing the limits of our expectations with our members and all stakeholder groups. I’m lucky enough to have a working relationship with hundreds of coaches, vendors, sponsors, spectators, athletes, referees, volunteers, event directors, boards members, etc. and those relationships have been the primary reason as to why we’ve been able to ensure the USRowing regatta experience is a positive experience for all.  And we’re not done yet!

What goals do you have personally and for the United States Rowing Association in 2025?

My team and I are striving to create the gold-standard sporting experience for USRowing members. We want USRowing regattas to be the most memorable sporting event that they attend in 2025. We owe it to our membership to bring them as much joy as possible while rowing!

On a personal level, I spend a lot of time working with CVB’s, Cities, and Counties to grow rowing venues throughout the US and I plan to continue to bring the education behind what it means to bring a rowing event to your city!