Angus R. Maclaurin

Angus R. Maclaurin '00

As a first-year he set a world record. It barely makes his personal highlight list.

At the World Indoor Rowing Championships on Feb. 16, 1997, Gus R. Maclaurin '00 rowed 2,000 meters on a rowing machine faster than anyone in his age group and weight class had ever done before. A few hours later, he did it again.

But the rush of the world record he set--and re-set--that late winter day his first year does not compare, he says, to other achievements he has experienced in rowing.

"Winning the national championships was definitely the highest moment," he says. Last year, he was a member of the varsity boat that captured the Intercollegiate Rowing Association crown.

"Rowing is inherently a team sport," he says. "That's some of the magic about it. You strive to work together. When you win, no one person gets singled out for all the glory. When that's what you're used to, that's what drives you."

Actually Maclaurin almost didn't become a rower. He only picked up the sport in high school after being cut from the tennis team. Two years later, as a junior, he was a member of the high school national championship boat at New Hampshire's St. Paul.

At Harvard, rowing has been at the center of a busy life. He has rowed all four years and served as co-captain of the lightweight varsity team as a senior.

A joint concentrator in East Asian Studies and Anthropology, MacLaurin will be moving to the business world next year, working for an Internet consulting firm in Boston.

"My rowing career is almost done," he ruminates. "It's going to leave a hole in my life, but I see it as time to move on. I'll look back on it with fond memories.

"Harvard is a tough place to be in the sense that everyone is so successful," he continues. "You feel like you're behind. I didn't feel that way for rowing."

With a pair of national championship in high school and college, as well as a world record, he certainly shouldn't.