Scholar Stories: Hendershot's Competitiveness Fuels Drive to Succeed
4/12/2017 12:00:00 AM | Rowing, Features
Every Wednesday during the 2016-17 academic year, MGoBlue.com will highlight a different student-athlete and their academic path. These are our Scholar Stories.
By Jared Berson
Some people enjoy competition. Others live for it. Consider University of Michigan rowing sophomore Caroline Hendershot part of the latter category.
Growing up as the youngest in a household in which both parents had played Division I sports and all three siblings would go on to play as well, competitiveness was necessary as a means of keeping up.
"First it was 'Who can run up the stairs the fastest?' and it even honestly became 'Who could eat dinner the fastest?'" she said. "Everything possible was a competition."
Hendershot actually never rowed before the summer prior to her junior year of high school. She was a high school volleyball star at Simsbury High School in Connecticut, making the all-state team two times. But she also recognized that her 5-foot-11 stature was "short" when it came to outside hitting in Division I volleyball.
Her hesitation for taking up rowing? She didn't want to compete in the same sport as one of her sisters; her older sister, Sara, rowed at Princeton. Caroline was initially determined to blaze her own path but ultimately relented, and when she finally tried rowing, she immediately thought to herself, "Dang it, they were all right."
"Once I tried rowing, it was game over," she said.
Unsurprisingly, she quickly became an elite rower and was recruited by several major universities. She says that before recruiting started, she had never even heard of the University of Michigan.
"As soon I stepped on campus," she said, "I knew I was going to come here. It was the best of everything in one city."
She acknowledges that balancing rowing, school responsibilities and trying to find free time or time to participate in other clubs was difficult when she was a freshman. Still, she managed to capture a starting role on Michigan's 2V8 boat. This year, she has settled in and has been able to start in on a few ventures that mark the beginning of her career in sports media.
Hendershot works for Wolverine Women, a weekly show for WOLV-TV in which she has interviewed student-athletes and compiled video clips of analysis, gaining experience in front of the camera.
She also started working for Big Ten Network's Student U this semester. With that experience, she has garnered exposure to the technical production side of sports media, something she had never witnessed before.
Hendershot is determined to make her mark on the sports industry, a mission she feels is especially important because of the relatively low female representation that dominates the field. She believes that working in television could be an excellent avenue to fulfill her goals. "Television would give me a great platform for speaking up about women in sports," she said.
The reason she wants to work in the sports industry? Competition, of course. She says sports have been such a pivotal part of her life that she can't imagine working in any other industry.
Her level of competitiveness has fueled an incredible drive and work ethic that translates to everything she does. She recalled a story from high school in which she stayed up late on the floor of her room writing a paper on her laptop only to wake up in the middle of the night -- on the floor, laptop open -- and keep working.
"I've always pushed myself to be the best in all aspects of my life," she said.
This summer she's set to intern for the Hartford Yard Goats, a minor-league affiliate of MLB's Colorado Rockies that plays just 20 minutes from her home. It's a comprehensive internship program that will allow her to determine what aspect of working in sports she likes best.
The opportunity to differentiate herself from her siblings will come. All of them went to smaller schools in the Northeast. Caroline has a chance to be the first in her family to be a Big Ten champion.
"If you can win the Big Ten championship in your sport, you are doing something really special."
But even as she strives to continue to make a name for herself, it will be that sibling bond -- and rivalry -- that may not separate her from her blood relatives but will surely distinguish her from practically anyone else.
Players Mentioned
