Isnor finds home at Brock
Jordan Isnor made her first visit to the Royal Canadian Henley Regatta in 2017 as a member of the Nanaimo Rowing Club.
Isnor and her clubmates made use of Brock University’s boathouse and the 19-year-old Nanaimo, B.C., native made an immediate impression on Brock’s coaching staff.
“I got an opportunity to meet the girls, see how they were in the boathouse, see their personalities, look at their drive, see how they rowed and she was one of the gals, for sure, that I wanted to come here,” Brock coach Swede Burak said.
It didn’t hurt that Nanaimo’s head coach, Craig Rutherford, was a Brock rowing alumnus, but it didn’t take much to convince Isnor.
“I met Peter (head coach Somerwil) and Swede and they were trying to recruit me,” she said. “Instantly I wanted to come to Brock. They were so welcoming.”
St. Catharines was the perfect place for Isnor to enhance her rowing career.
“It was the coaches and rowing in St. Catharines is so huge compared to B.C.” she said. “I knew it would be a good opportunity to row and the political science program at Brock was really good.”
Her Brock teammates welcomed her with open arms.
“The team atmosphere was so amazing,” she said. “It was so inviting and as soon as I came here the first week, it instantly felt like home.”
Isnor made Brock’s varsity team and rowed in the lightweight single and four. At the Ontario University Athletics championships, she rowed in both the heavyweight and lightweight doubles. She won a silver in the heavyweight double and fourth in the lightweight event. Isnor then placed sixth overall in the single at the Canadian university championships and fifth in the four.
“I was happy to make the A (single) final because I was the youngest person in it,” she said. “It was really exciting.”
Burak has been impressed with Isnor’s results at Brock.
“She’s a great girl to have on board,” he said. “She came as a pure sculler and fit into the sweep program right off the bat.
“She’s one of the fastest girls on the team from last year and she had a great winter training program.”
Burak sees great things in store for the teenager.
“With her drive and goals, she will have more national team opportunities coming up.”
Prior to arriving at Brock in 2018, she represented Canada at the CanAmMex regatta in Mexico City.
This summer, once Henley is over, Isnor will be a member of Canada under-21 national team. She was one of five women chosen to compete against athletes from Australia and New Zealand in the Trans-Tasman Regatta. She’ll represent Canada in the lightweight single event.
Two of her classmates at Brock, Thomas Markewich and Sam Stewart, are also a part of Canada’s squad.
Athletes were chosen after the 2019 Speed Orders and the 2019 NextGen National Team Selection Camp held in Victoria, B.C.
Isnor is looking forward to the event, which will be held at Lake Karapiro in New Zealand from Aug. 22 to 24.
“It’s going to be against older people and it will be nice racing in my actual category, which is lightweight,” she said. “It will be exciting to see what I can do there.”
Representing Canada for the second time is a big deal for Isnor.
“You kind of take it for granted, but it is very humbling”
She has been training in Kingston for the under-21 regatta but will compete for the St. Catharines Rowing Club at the Royal Canadian Henley Regatta this week in the under-23 lightweight single and the senior lightweight eight. Isnor didn’t advance to the semifinals in single, but she’s expecting better results in the St. Catharines lightweight eight.
“There’s a lot of experience in the boat and a girl who went to under-23 worlds,” she said. “There’s a lot of knowledgable rowers so it should be a fast boat.”
