Mourning Those Who Contributed Much

Julie (Adams) Bennett has lots of memories from her days at Glen Lake High School. Many are great, some not so great.

And, while she took all of them with her as she just rowed across the Pacific Ocean, her battle with anorexia was at the top.

“In our culture, thin is beautiful, and it always has been,” said Bennett, a 1982 Lakers graduate. “We grew up in the '70s with all of the magazines and all of the thin models. I was kind of a fat kid in junior high. You know, you get a little chunky, and then you grow taller. Well, I got chunky, but I never grew taller.”

Bennett found herself in a battle with anorexia, leading her to raise funds and awareness for the National Eating Disorders Association as she recently competed in and completed the World's Toughest Row. The crossing occurred after more than a year of preparation, and NEDA was one of four organizations the team supported as part of taking on the challenge.

“I was teased a lot for my weight in high school,” recalled Bennett, who experienced hurtful name-calling. “It isn't the only reason why I became anorexic, but I did. I know people who don't recover from anorexia. It takes their life. I was one of the lucky ones”

Bennett was a middle distance runner on the Lakers track team and a key member of the cheer team. Fall was spent supporting the football team and winter the basketball team as Title IX was just starting to impact sports opportunities for girls.

“When I was in junior high, there were no competitive girl sports,” Bennett said. “I know a lot of people look at cheerleading and think ‘oh they're just fluffy girls who are really girly and just want to cheer.’ But every summer, we did competitive cheer camps.”

Bennett picked up rowing when her youngest son, Steven, joined the sport as a freshman in high school in the Grand Rapids area. It wasn’t long before she began coaching adults and kids in the sport after years of teaching group fitness and yoga.

Bennett points to positive role models, like her mother, Pam, and multiple coaches, as having played significant roles in her battle with overcoming anorexia.

“They really put me on a path to make wise decisions about the food that I eat and about physical fitness,” she said. “So I had always just had a much healthier relationship with exercising and food than I could have. I mean, I could have gone off the rails.”

Bennett believes high school sports allow student-athletes learn discipline. It was that same discipline that helped her complete the 2,800-mile trip across the Pacific Ocean just a few weeks ago.

Bennett, along Erin Enk-Wiese, Susan Katt and Jak Kazmarek, left Monterey, Calif., on June 9 after a five-day weather delay. The four rowers landed 40 days later in Kauai, Hawaii. 

The average crossing time for crews of all sizes over the history of the World’s Toughest Row is 62 days. The first boat to conquer the world’s deepest ocean this year took 36 days. Bennett’s team, Moar Than Us, was thrilled the trip was pretty much free of challenging weather, injury and other significant incidents.

“The discipline of sports, and the coaching that I got, was what really set me on a path to – not just for rowing, but it really just set me on a path – to be disciplined about my physical fitness,” she said. “You really need the discipline, but you don't think that you do, because you think you know everything when you're 16. All of that discipline really, really helped me mentally and physically and put me on a journey of lifelong physical fitness.”

Bennett’s crew took turns taking two-hour shifts in daylight and three-year shifts in the dark. The boat always had two in the rowing seats and two below resting and recovering. They did start and finish the race with all four crew members playing a role up top.

Bennett, who went on the graduate from Hope College and land her first teaching job at Glen Lake, is quick to identify the key to coaching high school sports today, especially rowing. She’s on the coaching staff of the Grand Rapids Rowing Club, one of just a small number of high school-sponsored rowing clubs in Michigan.

“You teach them to love the sport, and then you teach them how to do it,” Bennett said. “You have to teach them how to love it. I was an endurance person and rowing certainly is an endurance sport.”

Rowing is a natural sport for the 5-foot-4 former Laker, despite her undergoing hip replacement during her 40s.

She fondly remembers her track experience at Glen Lake. While she mostly ran the 400 and 800 along with relays, her coaches entered her in all field events in hopes she could pick up a point or two.

“I don't have quick-twitch muscles, so I was not good enough to be in the sprints, but I ran sprint relays,” acknowledged Bennett. “Because we were a small team, if there was a third place to be had, coaches would throw me in. I threw shot put a couple of times. I remember throwing shot put against Mesick. They could throw it twice as far, but I got the point in third.”

Bennett noted the Pacific crossing annually attracts sailors and navigators, along with a few others.

“It also attracts just people who are adrenaline junkies,” she said. “People who just want that jolt from doing something amazing.”

Bennett though, did it for other reasons, including raising awareness for anorexia.

“The best message that you can give somebody is that you can be any age, any gender, any size, and do it,” she said. “You can do difficult things, and you shouldn't shortchange yourself by not being mentally ready for that challenge.”

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PHOTOS (Top) At left, Julie Bennett stands in formation with her Glen Lake cheer team in 1979. At right, Bennett stands next to a sign explaining the accomplishment after completing the Pacific Ocean crossing with her crewmates. (Middle) Bennett, front row and fourth from left, poses for a team photo with her high school track team. (Below) The Moar Than US team rows toward Hawaii, and celebrates its accomplishment. (Glen Lake photos courtesy of the Glen Lake yearbook staff. Moar Than US photos courtesy of World's Toughest Row, More Than US team and Bennett family.)