STUDENT PROFILE: Linda Vanevenhoven
 ach March 1 for the past three years, Linda Vanevenhoven
arose before dawn, folded her 5-foot, 10-inch frame into a fiberglass-and-epoxy
canoe—a practice model—and set out on Madison’s Yahara
River. On some March days when she and her partner, Amy Roth, paddle,
the frigid water is liberally sprinkled with ice chunks. Nearly every
day for weeks after, the two follow the same routine—a schedule
that not only has prepared them for competition, but one that has helped
to make the Concrete Canoe Team two-time national champions and a top
candidate for a third title. (As of this writing,
the 2005 team won its cold, rainy regional competition in Chicago.)
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Linda Vanevenhoven
(right) and Amy Roth in the 2004 national champion canoe
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JPG) |
Although she has paddled the canoe to several victories
throughout the past three years, her physical strength is just one of
the ways she contributes to the Concrete Canoe Team—and to its
“parent,” the UW-Madison student chapter of the American
Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE).“The very first thing I joined
was Steel Bridge,” says Vanevenhoven, whose early-life interest
in designing bridges led her to pursue a civil engineering degree. Then
a sophomore, she also joined ASCE, to become even more involved.
That first year, she was part of the Steel Bridge
Construction Team—the students who race to assemble their bridge
the fastest. “The idea is that you make fast connections between
your pieces to try to make construction more efficient,” Vanevenhoven
says.
In 2003, the bridge team’s efforts resulted
in a first-place finish in the construction speed category (62 seconds—fastest
in the competition’s history) and second-place overall national
finish. (At its regional competition in Chicago,
this year’s Steel Bridge Team placed first overall, first in economy,
first in efficiency, second in construction speed, first in lightness
and first in stiffness.)
Vanevenhoven also joined the Concrete Canoe Team
as a paddler and for two years, juggled membership on both it and the
bridge team. This year, after soliciting input from her teammates and
fellow paddlers, she designed the canoe’s hull, using boat- and
yacht-design software.
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The Concrete Canoe
Team (Linda pictured far left)
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JPG) |
“You can use it to change all kinds of things,
like the width, which is called the beam; and the length, the depth;
the freeboard, which is how much of the boat you can see above the water;
and the rocker, which is how much the ends are lifted from the center,”
she says. “I did a lot of research on specific terms and how they’re
supposed to affect performance, and then I looked at what these things
were in the last two canoes and tried to incorporate the information
I found.”
The resulting design for “Taliesin” combined
the best features of the 2004 canoe, “Rock Solid,” which
was fast, and the 2003 canoe, “Chequamegon,” which was stable
and a quick turner. “The hull that I made performed on the water
pretty much how I expected,” says Vanevenhoven.
A sports enthusiast, she plays on intramural volleyball
and basketball teams, and participates in other ASCE activities such
as outreach and working on UW-Madison’ Habitat for Humanity house.
She likes to run, rollerblade and canoe—even when she’s
not gearing up for competition. In any free time she can find, she also
sews and makes quilts; she reads and hangs out with friends. She has
a high GPA and has completed an internship and co-op at MSA Professional
Services, an engineering, architectural and planning firm with which
she will work again this summer. In the fall 2004 semester, she was
president of ASCE and currently, she and partner Roth are planning the
2006 Concrete Canoe and Steel Bridge Regional Competition, which UW-Madison
is hosting.
Although she’s busy, Vanevenhoven enjoys whatever
she’s doing. “I think a lot of the reason that I like it
so much is that I’m working with all of my friends in the organizations.
The canoe and ASCE and bridge teams—those are my friends, so it
makes it easier,” she says. “I’m working on all of
these projects with friends, so it doesn’t seem like work anymore.
I didn’t know anybody when I joined, but I’ve been lucky
enough to find my place.”
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