Publishers Weekly
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved

Sing (Spirituality of Sport) recounts the 1920 Olympics when the American crew team beat the British, who dominated the sport until then. Thoroughly researched and documented, the book explores the rise of the modern Olympic games and the history of rowing and the life of coach Dick Glendon--all provide context for the sport and its culture. In the vein of Wayne Coffey's The Boys of Winter, about the 1980 U.S. Olympic hockey team, Sing creates a David vs. Goliath scenario made possible by an unconventional coach, who revolutionized the sport. Unfortunately, Sing's prose can be cumbersome ("A revealing and stunningly important article by Dr. Walter Peet, past coach of Columbia, proceeded to dissect and analyze the empirical thinking of Glendon that in a nutshell is a synopsis of the Glendon stroke, which is the basis of the newly found and tried American Orthodoxy"), but crew fans will appreciate how triumph in a sport lifts a nation. Photos. (July) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved

Kirkus
Copyright © Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

A U.S. Naval Academy crew stuns the rowing world by upsetting the British team at the 1920 Olympics. First-time author Saint Sing, herself a former world-class rower, demonstrates laudable enthusiasm and scholarship in her account of an upset rivaling the U.S. hockey team's victory over the Russians at the Lake Placid Olympics. But her prose, ranging from hyperbolic to wooden, generally fails to bring to life either the drama or its characters. The story's hero is legendary Navy coach Richard Glendon, who brought a new scientific thinking to the sport. The son of a Cape Cod mackerel fisherman, Glendon designed a new style of rowing oar and a revolutionary new rowing stroke; he even tried oiling the bottoms of ducks to see whether the substance would give greater speed to his boats. His upstart Navy team had already conquered the American rowing world, but at the 1920 Antwerp Games it was still an underdog to the all-star British Leander squad, whose rowers were plucked from Oxford, Cambridge and other centuries-old rowing clubs. Saint Sing muffs the buildup to the climactic championship race by skipping virtually any description of the early Olympic heats and the crucial semifinal against France. She does a better job with the finale itself, in which the U.S. squad shattered the world record by more than six seconds for a narrow, come-from-behind victory. Glendon went on to coach for many more years. When he died in 1956, Admiral Chester Nimitz, a member of Glendon's 1905 Navy team, ordered that news of his passing be immediately sent to every ship in the Navy. Saint Sing's journeyman skills don't do full justice to the high drama of this tale of grit, teamwork and Olympic sportsmanship. Copyright ©Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

Book list
From Booklist, Copyright © American Library Association. Used with permission.

The list of people who have altered the course of their sport is a short one. Think Hank Luisetti, who brought the jump shot to basketball. Another is Richard Glendon, who altered the course of rowing and set America on an unparalleled streak of Olympic gold medals. In 1904, after years of coaching crew in Boston's thriving and competitive rowing community, he accepted a position as the head crew coach at the U.S. Naval Academy. At the time, Britain dominated international rowing competition, and the Ivy League colleges dominated the American scene. Conventional wisdom held that, to defeat the Brits, crews had to mimic the British methods. Glendon, the son of an immigrant Irish fishing family, began experimenting with the composition of the boats, the point in the stroke at which maximum power was applied, and even substances to reduce friction as the boat traveled. Sing, an expert on rowing history, makes this arcane world come alive with detailed period context, vivid portraits of the key players, and an engaging prose style. In an Olympic year, expect considerable interest in this carefully researched sports history.--Lukowsky, Wes Copyright 2008 Booklist