In Claire Collins’ senior year Ivy Championships in 2019, her boat soared to a first-place finish in the varsity eight event by a margin of just under four seconds — yet she had no idea how her teammates had done in the second varsity boat. The moment she found out they too had won, Collins burst into tears.
“I ran to her because she almost couldn’t get out of the boat, and I was asking ‘Claire, are you hurt?’ and was calling for first aid,” Lori Dauphiny, Collins’ coach at Princeton, recalled.
“‘No, no, I’m okay,’” she recalled Collins responding. “‘I’m just so happy for the team and what we did together, what we built together, and how we performed together.’”
For Collins, it’s not about her success, it’s about the team’s — a mindset that took her and her team to success at Princeton and has made her a two-time Olympic qualifier.
“It’s [about] enjoying that team atmosphere and knowing that you can create that wherever you go,” Collins told the Daily Princetonian.
After leaving Tokyo empty-handed in 2021, Collins hopes to use this mindset to leave the City of Light this time around with hardware in tow.
Picking rowing as the path forward
Collins left her hometown of McLean, Va. to embark on her rowing career with Deerfield Academy’s high school team, where she honed the skills that would later propel her to collegiate and international acclaim.
As a multi-sport athlete, Collins captained her high school’s swimming and volleyball teams in addition to rowing for Deerfield. Despite being mainly a swimmer in high school, she realized after a few captain’s practices that she had an aptitude for rowing.
“[Rowing] just got off to a pretty good start,” Collins said. “I really ended up loving it.”
Collins’ earliest taste of victories came with titles at the Youth National Championships in 2014 and 2015 in the women’s four event. Following this, Collins joined the Junior National Team. At the Junior World Championships, she won silver in the 8+ in 2012 at just 15 years old, placed fifth in the 8+ in 2013, and attained another silver in the 4- the following year.
These successes at Deerfield and on the global stage caught the attention of Princeton women’s open rowing head coach Lori Dauphiny.
“She was widely known in the coach’s circle because she cranked out an awesome 2k erg,” Dauphiny, who is also headed to Paris to coach for Team USA, told the ‘Prince.’ “She was always full of fire and really driven and determined before she came to Princeton … we couldn’t recruit her at the time because she was too young, but we knew she had the potential to be a star,” Dauphiny added.
Dominating Lake Carnegie and beyond
At Princeton, Collins’ prowess on the water was nothing short of exceptional. Despite a significant change from a single season commitment to a yearlong endeavor, Collins was grateful for the chance to focus on rowing full-time.
“It was a really awesome transition to go through, because there was always a lot of novelty to it,” Collins stated.
During her time at Old Nassau, Collins garnered accolades that matched the character Dauphiny spotted during recruitment. She was awarded the C. Otto von Kienbusch Award for Princeton’s top senior female athlete in 2019 and also earned a nomination for NCAA Woman of the Year that same year.
Dauphiny praised Collins’ dedication not just to rowing, but the broader campus community.
“I think one of the reasons she got the Otto von Kienbusch award was because she had a deep impact on people even outside of our team,” Dauphiny said. “She was a part of the VSAAC (Varsity Student Athlete Advisory Committee) and was just the kind of person who was able to balance a lot and be involved and perform at the highest level.”
On the international stage during her collegiate career, she won bronze in the eight in 2018 and silver in 2017 with the Under 23 National Team.
Her Princeton career was marked by three All-American titles and four All-Ivy distinctions, cementing her status as a force to be reckoned with in the collegiate rowing circuit. Yet, Collins believed in staying humble, always knowing when to ask for help — whether from her teammates or McGraw.
“If you’re going to soak up everything you can at Princeton, there’s no time to struggle too much on your own,” Collins added. “There are so many people to lean on.”
Leaving the Bubble to chase Olympic glory
After graduating from Princeton in 2019, Collins set her sights on the biggest stage of them all — the Olympics. She quickly made the jump from Princeton to the Olympic team to compete for the United States in the women’s four for the 2021 Tokyo Games.
“I almost didn’t believe it,” Collins said.
Most rowers peak in their late 20s, so she didn't believed she could make the team so fresh out of college. Indeed, Collins initially hoped to qualify for the 2024 Games when she first began her training journey, not the nearing Tokyo Games.
“My goal when I first decided to try out for the national team and go to the training center was for Paris,” Collins said. “I really feel like I had my head down a lot [in] the process for Tokyo, and it was almost surprising that I was even on the edge to make it.”
While Princeton’s strong rowing program certainly helped guide Collins on the road to the Olympics, Dauphiny believes athletes like Collins chart their destiny without the program’s help.
“Honestly, they do all the work to prepare,” Dauphiny wrote to the ‘Prince.’
At the Tokyo Games, the United States women’s four came up short, finishing in seventh place behind gold medal-winning Australia. The only other female Tiger to row at the Tokyo Games was Hannah Scott ’21, who also finished in seventh place in quad sculls for Great Britain.
Following this performance, Collins continued her training on the senior national team. She competed in the women’s pair and women’s eight in 2022 at the World Championships, achieving third place in the former and fourth in the latter, as well as the women’s four in 2023, finishing fourth.
The Olympics were not the first setback in Collins’ rowing career. Dauphiny recalled how her perseverance and commitment to improvement were evident during a rough patch at Princeton.
“We faltered, we didn’t do well [in] the National Championship,” Dauphiny said. “She was one of the people … that said, ‘We want to change this. We want to be better. How can we do it?’”
Collins’ work ethic has paid off. Now, she is back with Team USA to compete in Paris as the fifth seat of the Women’s 8+. Collins is grateful to have another shot at clinching Olympic glory.
“I’m really excited. It’s a different boat class, it’s a different year,” Collins stated.
“Without being dramatic, I can’t describe enough how different this process has been [compared to] Tokyo,” Collins added. “We have a new set of coaches and a new high-performance director, so the training is very different.”
From her time at Deerfield to Princeton’s tight-knit squad, Collins’ has always valued a close and supportive community — and this year’s American delegation has the right dynamic to help them secure victory, in her view.
“[This] team is just a lot closer in terms of the bonding and the support and the more unified approach that we have all together.”
Nine Tigers will head to Paris to row for their home countries. Dauphiny, who has been a coach at Princeton for 27 years, attributes the Orange and Black’s success in putting its rowers on the path to Olympic glory by teaching them to compete “in a competitive environment with a solid race schedule in a strong league.”
Collins’ second shot at Olympic glory is a testament to Dauphiny’s goals for the program and a reflection of her dedication to the sport, from high school to college and beyond.
As she heads to Paris, the supportive environment she helped build at Princeton, and found on Team USA, will be there to guide her to victory. Hopefully for her, second time is the charm.
Francie McKenzie is a staff Sports writer for the ‘Prince.’
Raphaela Gold contributed reporting.
Please send any corrections to corrections[at]dailyprincetonian.com.
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