Ryan Fox: Reaching for the Stars

March 17, 2011

It used to be that when Ryan Fox talked about reaching for the stars, he meant as an American astronaut.

“I always wanted to be one as a kid,” said Fox. “I really like space, so I decided to continue to pursue that when I got to college.”

So Fox enrolled at the University of Wisconsin and majored in astronomy and physics. But then, during freshman orientation, the Wisconsin lightweight coaches who were out hunting for potential walk-on rowers, spotted the 6’3” athletic-looking, new student, and the plans for space exploration were eventually put on hold.

“I sort of got sidetracked by rowing,” said Fox.

Today, when the 25-year-old Edgerton, Wis., native is reaching for the stars, what he means is, he’s reaching for a spot on the U.S. lightweight men’s team and a chance to compete at the 2012 Olympic Games in London.

“Now to be an astronaut, you need a PhD,” said Fox. “That’s not really in the cards with rowing right now. What is in the cards, are long days of training at the USRowing Training Center in Oklahoma City, Okla., and working at the Oklahoma Medical Research Foundation as a programming consultant, writing programming to help with a project tracking rheumatoid arthritis patients’ data.

“Right now my goal is to train through 2012. We’ll see where I am after that.”

If anyone would have told Fox when he started college that he would be a Division I college athlete, and then a two-time member of the U.S. national team with a good chance at going to the Olympics, he probably wouldn’t have believed them.

“In high school, I was in cross country, basketball and baseball, but none of those were going to be a college sport for me,” said Fox. “So I kind of figured I was done going into college. At freshman orientation, the coaches hang out looking for tall guys. They said ‘Hey, if you want to row, come down to the Porter Boathouse.’ I showed up at the first meeting and never turned back.”

During his time as a Wisconsin lightweight, Fox won a bronze medal at Eastern Sprints in 2009 and was steered toward the U.S. national team lightweight camp.

There, he earned a seat in the lightweight eight that competed in Poznan, Poland and added a world championships silver medal to his collection of hardware. Fox graduated the following spring and finished second in the lightweight pair at the third 2010 National Selection Regatta. He went on to earn a seat in the lightweight four, which finished 10th at the 2010 World Rowing Championships at Lake Karapiro, New Zealand.

Fox, along with several other lightweight hopefuls, relocated to Oklahoma City where he trains two to three times a day. The first step to his Olympic dream is making the lightweight four that will compete in the 2011 World Rowing Championships this summer in Bled, Slovenia.

So far, Fox has no regrets about putting his astronaut plans on hold to row for the U.S. national team.
 
“It’s great to represent the U.S. and travel abroad,” said Fox. “It’s such a high level of competition. It’s such a great experience.”

And his parents are behind him. “They’ve been great; they’re completely supportive. They’ve been behind me 100 percent.”

Ed Moran

Features