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Article published Oct 21, 2007 ‘Paddle Like a Girl’: Boteler endorses activity
By Melanie Tucker of The Daily Times Staff
The names are familiar — Wilma Rudolph, Babe Didrikson, Jackie Joyner-Kersee, Billie Jean King, Martina Navratilova and Nancy Lieberman — female athletes who have made all of us stand and take notice.
The top American woman in sprint canoeing today, Pam Boteler, can appreciate the fact you’ve never heard her name. Her sport isn’t the subject of ESPN prime time. In fact, hers is the only Olympic sport other than boxing that excludes women. Men have been competing in the sport in the Olympics since 1936.
Kneeling in a carbon-fiber boat and paddling on one side for up to 1,000 meters, Boteler is the picture of gracefulness and girl power. Her sport is a classic test of speed, power, balance and also endurance. Race distances are 1,000, 500 and 200 meters. Boteler just wishes more girls would latch on to the sport that reeled her in.
Boteler was in Maryville last week, a guest of the Mountain Challenge program at Maryville College. She spoke to a newly formed group of students, faculty and staff called Mountain Challenge Girls, whose purpose is to pilot a program that could be offered to middle school girls next year. The aim is to keep girls active past adolescence.
Boteler has been competing in sprint canoeing since 2000, and before that it was sprint kayaking, the sister sport to sprint canoeing. Before that it was basketball and running.
When she was growing up, girls who pushed their way into the sports arena were called tomboys. Boteler read about the female athletes like Babe Didrikson and other track athletes who broke barriers in their respective sports. To her, they were so much more than runners or athletes.
“I looked up to the girls and women in sports,” she said. “There was just a grace about how they moved on a basketball court or track. It was how they played. I was attracted to that power and their ability to still be a girl, too.”Paddle like a girl
A favorite T-shirt of Boteler’s sums it up: Paddle like a girl. She made U.S. canoe/kayak history by doing just that — against men. She became the first woman to compete in sprint canoe against men in the 2000 National Championships, winning the 500-meter, two-person division with Canadian masters champion Heather McNie. In 2001, she paddled with three elite men and won the 1,000-meter, four person title. In 2002 the bylaws were changed to allow women to compete at the National Championships in events of their own.
There are more opportunities today for women athletes than 20 years ago. Not having gender equality for her sport in the Olympics, however, makes this lifetime athlete want to continue speaking out and encouraging other women to find the athlete voice inside.
At 39, Boteler said she hasn’t reached her peak. She was once told by a former boss to “just grow up,” as she tried to balance competitions and a full-time job with the federal government. She left that job. She now works for the Department of Defense.
“There is so much more out there to learn,” Boteler said. “I don’t want to grow up. I have competition 20 years younger than I am. ... I am going to set the bar high enough where they have something to reach for.”
There are groups working to get women’s sprint canoeing into the Olympics. There is no way to predict when or if that will happen. But there was reason for optimism recently when the International Olympic Committee announced there will be a 2010 Youth Olympics for athletes 14 to 18, in all sports for both men and women for all countries. The head of the International Canoe Federation has stated there will be women’s sprint canoe in those 2010 Youth Olympics. Boteler said it’s time to recruit girls who will be the right age to compete in three years.
The United States can look to Canada, who is leading the way in women’s sprint canoeing. The infrastructure is there along with the political influence that is so necessary.The work goes on
As part of the Washington Canoe Club in Washington, D.C., Boteler has her schedule mapped out at least through 2009. Clubs compete in the Pan American Championships in Montreal, Canada next May. They are not allowed, however, to compete in the Pan American Games.
She has gotten the opportunity to speak to girls across the country and works with WomenCan an international group of women and men dedicated to creating race opportunities for sprint canoeists. A Web site, www.justcanoeit.com provides updates on gains in the sport.
It concerns Boteler that when girls reach puberty a lot of them choose to suppress the athlete they have become. She wants them to know it’s possible to be strong, powerful and female.
“My voice comes from my body,” Boteler said. “I want to encourage girls to embrace their body and everything about it. Make it as strong as you can. Make your mind strong. Those skills will carry over into anything in your life.”