With the guidance of O’Leary, Lofgren quickly blossomed into an elite rower on the Charles.

“Rowing is a sport where it just takes miles and miles of practice, you just have to put in your time and do the training,” O’Leary said. “She works hard in our workouts as a team, but she’ll come into the boathouse on a Sunday afternoon and sit in the erg by herself. She just has that look in her eyes that she wants to be successful.”

But even with the numerous accolades she picked up in college, including two appearances on the U.S. Under-23 National Team—Lofgren took home a gold medal in the eight at the 2006 World Rowing Championships—the rower also faced obstacles throughout her collegiate career that were often discouraging and frustrating.

Before her stint at the 2008 Olympics trial, Lofgren took the fall semester off in 2004.

To keep up with her rowing, she competed for a club team, only to find out that her participation, as dictated by NCAA rules, prevented her from competing for Radcliffe once she returned in the spring.

“For her, it was crushing,” O’Leary said. “You train all winter, but because of the rules, she couldn’t do it. But she still came to all the practices. When she couldn’t be in the boat, she was still there for the team. It was a pretty remarkable level of commitment, she kept training. Those are the kind of potholes to recover from.”

“She did have her failures, some rowing-wise, some not, but she was always willing to pick herself back up and come back hard again,” O’Leary added.

In true Esther Lofgren fashion, the rower responded to her setbacks, capping off her collegiate career with a silver medal at the 2009 Eastern Sprints.

“My most memorable experience rowing for Radcliffe was our race at Eastern Sprints,” Lofgren wrote. “We found our rhythm and the power in our legs and just went. That silver medal—a half-second behind Yale, a second ahead of Princeton—was so sweet to win, and I was so happy to be a part of such a fun and fast crew.”

As pair partners with Lofgren for most of her junior year, Baugh also cited the race as one to remember.

“It was one of the best races in my memory because I got to row next to Esther,” Baugh said. “She always had faith in me…and I definitely looked up to her.”

A TASTE OF GOLD

Upon graduation, Lofgren found herself out on the water pursuing a professional career in crew.

With a refined understanding of the sport from her Radcliffe rowing days, Lofgren has spent the last two years competing for the US Rowing team, earning a silver medal in the four at the 2009 World Rowing Championships and winning gold in the eight at the 2010 Rowing World Cup stop in Lucerne, Italy.

Last week, on Lake Karapiro in New Zealand, Lofgren earned her first gold medal in the eight at the World Rowing Championships.