SRA Stories: Justin Buckley

High school is portrayed quite frequently through movies, novels, and television show adaptations. Often, our main character is a young adult trying to find where they fit in and who they want to become. In real life, high school mirrors those dramatizations quite closely as youths enter the transition from child to young adult. In the United States especially, it can seem like these kids are thrown directly into a pit of responsibility as their grades and extracurriculars are heavily scrutinized before and during the college admissions process.

Trying to figure out who you are, what you want to be, and how you’re going to get there all while your prefrontal cortex is still not fully developed can be incredibly overwhelming. Luckily for SRA Junior Program alumni Justin Buckley, he had Sammamish Rowing Association (SRA) to anchor him during this time. 

During the summer following 8th grade, Buckley was encouraged to give rowing a try by his friends and family. “I realized how much more dedicated my teammates at rowing were than my teammates in my other sports. I was smitten pretty quickly,” Buckley said. In 9th and 10th grade, Buckley split his time between rowing and soccer, but before long, “rippin’ watts on the erg” was all he could think about.

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“SRA was the first place I felt like I was truly with my people,” Buckley commented. “My teammates had the same ambitions as me, and the team dynamic reinforced a culture of hard work and commitment to the craft. In a lot of ways, SRA was my high school experience. Rowing was the highlight of my day. It occupied a good chunk of my thoughts during the school day, and it was an area where I could make tangible, consistent improvements that made me feel like I was actually going somewhere with my life. During those periods in high school when nothing else was going right, I could reliably pour my energy into my rowing and get a positive ROI. The more I invested in rowing, the better I got, and the more I wanted to invest further.”

Most juniors who row at SRA echo Buckley’s thoughts or have a similar experience. Like anything, rowing takes some getting used to. Rowers find that their coaches and teammates are incredibly supportive of the journey and they gain confidence in the boat and in their life outside the boathouse. Rowing is a constant teacher. One of the greatest lessons it teaches is teamwork. During his junior year in the Varsity 8+, Buckley experienced the power of teamwork firsthand. He and his boat had lost their race to Rose City at Regionals by one second even though they had been beating them at regattas all year.

Determined not to be defeated by Rose City again, Buckley and his teammates trained hard during his senior year. “The entire team had a hellacious winter that year where we put in a crazy amount of mileage on the erg and in the freezing cold on the water,” he remembered. “Everyone was pushing. The 4V pushed the 3V, the 3V pushed the 2V, and the 2V pushed the 1V. The result that year was everything we could have dreamed of. Not only did we stick it to Rose City and win gold in the 1V 8+, but every 8+, 1V through 4V, won gold, and Sammamish swept Regionals for the first time in history!”

Buckley, far right, with his teammates from the SRA Junior Boys squad.

Despite such a historic Regionals his senior year, Buckley said his greatest rowing accomplishment was breaking 6:00 on a 2k erg in 2024. Buckley is a private rowing coach (@rowrecruit on Instagram) helping high school student-athletes get recruited to row in college. It is important for him to practice what he preaches to his high school clients so he continues to train on the erg. It was his goal to break 6:00 on the 2k since May 2023 and he finally accomplished it in early 2024. “It was the culmination of so much work and even despite a great career at SRA and the Yale Lightweights, breaking six minutes is the happiest rowing memory for me,” he said.

While his days in a shell on the water are in the past for him, he still routinely trains on the erg and plans to continue incorporating it into his workouts for the foreseeable future. “My goals in rowing have shifted from me to my athletes,” Buckley admitted. “I've helped my athletes get recruited to every Ivy League school and earn over four million dollars in scholarship money. Being a part of young ambitious rowers' journeys is the most rewarding thing to me, and I'm really grateful for the opportunity to make my passion my job.”

We asked Buckley what his best advice for novice rowers is and he had plenty to say. He encourages novices to fall in love with the process, not the scoreboard. “Rowing rewards discipline over talent. You won't see progress day to day, but if you show up early, listen to your coaches, and give your full effort every practice, you'll quietly build the kind of foundation that almost nobody else has the patience for. The athletes I've seen go furthest aren't always the most gifted, they're just the ones who learned to enjoy the grind before it ever paid off,” he emphasized.

Buckley added that it was hard to find a way rowing has not transformed his life. “Rowing gave me direction in high school, got me into Yale, is the foundation of my thriving college recruiting business, and has taught me a resilience and dedication that makes me proud of myself,” he reflected. There is a long line of people for him to thank throughout his rowing journey and admitted he did not know of any sport that would have been more beneficial for his high school self. 

Like Buckley, many of our high school student-athletes are looking to grow into a more confident version of themselves but often lack the structure or mentors to help them navigate this uncertain period of their lives. Fortunately, the coaching staff at SRA have decades of experience in developing well-rounded rowers. Our coaches teach our juniors about sportsmanship, time-management, perseverance, teamwork, accountability, and so much more. 

Aside from his life as a rowing coach and mentor, Buckley has been playing the piano for almost 20 years and is almost a National Master in chess. In his spare time, he is also learning how to be a DJ! In whatever he does, Buckley puts forth his full effort just like he did during his junior days at SRA. We are thrilled to have him as part of our community and look forward to seeing the incredible impact he makes in the lives of other high school rowers.

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