Coach Susan Urbas has been a competitor and leader in the sport of rowing for the past thirty years. She has held numerous leadership positions at the local, regional, and national levels of the sport, including many years as a member of the Board of Directors of the United States Rowing Association, as President of the National Women’s Rowing Association, as a member and as Chair of the U.S. Women’s Olympic Rowing Committee, as Chair of the Midwest Rowing Council, and as President of the Chicago River Navy. She has been a licensed rowing official since 1980, and has coached at the University of Chicago and Northwestern University.

Susan co-founded the University of Chicago Women’s Crew in 1975 (first collegiate rowing program in Illinois), the Chicago Boat Club (now the Chicago River Rowing & Paddling Center) in 1979, and the Chicago Rowing Center in 2000. She is also a member of the Pennsylvania Athletic Club Rowing Association (Philadelphia). She has won numerous regional and national championship medals as both a sweep rower and sculler in lightweight and open weight events.

Susan has coached hundreds of novice, intermediate, senior, elite, and masters rowers, sweep rowing and sculling, in collegiate and club programs, and has helped aspiring elite athletes work their way through the national team training pipeline for the annual World Championships and quadrennial Olympic Games.