Rowing Adds Conny Kirsch to Coaching Staff

East Lansing, Mich. -- Head coach Stacey Rippetoe has announced the addition of Conny Kirsch to the Michigan State rowing program as an assistant coach. She brings a wealth of experience to the MSU Rowing Training Center, as she has been actively involved in coaching all levels of development throughout her career.

"Conny is bringing extensive coaching and rowing experience to our team," noted Rippetoe. " She is both a caring and competitive coach and I'm so pleased to be able to add her to our staff."

"I want to thank Head Coach Stacey Rippetoe for giving me an opportunity to contribute to the Michigan State boat speed and look forward to working alongside an incredible coaching staff," said Kirsch. "I am especially excited about being able to compete in the Big Ten Conference again."

Since 2019, Kirsch served as the Girls Head Coach at The Bolles School in Jacksonville, Florida. Under her tutelage, Bolles emerged as a rowing powerhouse; her athletes achieved top performances nationally at both the scholastic and club level. This past Spring her rowers qualified to compete in both the Scholastic and Youth Nationals. Kirsch brought four Bolles boats to the Scholastic Rowing National Championships in May of 2026, where the Bulldogs won silver in the lightweight 2x and a bronze in the Senior 4+. At the conclusion of the spring season, two Bolles boats qualified and competed successfully at Youth Nationals.

Before Bolles, Kirsch spent 16 years as a college coach, serving as an assistant at UMass, Indiana, and Central Florida. At UCF, she helped the Knights to five consecutive conference team titles (2015-19), guided the 2V8+ to four straight titles from 2015-2018 and coached the V4+ to a conference title in 2019. At Indiana, she served as the lead recruiter and coordinator, working with athletes from around the world. She helped the Hoosiers' second varsity eight to the most wins in program history in 2011. Kirsch began her collegiate coaching career at UMass, coaching freshmen, varsity four and lightweight rowers as well as coordinating team travel and recruiting.

For the last 20 years, Kirsch has been involved with coaching the sculling development of junior rowers for the US Rowing National team. She has been instrumental in teaching sculling skills for both boys and girls in various camps set up by US Rowing throughout the country. In her last six summers, she worked at the US Rowing Selection Development Camp serving as head coach in 2024 and in 2025. She has led both boys' and girls' camps throughout the years and rowers from those camps have been selected to compete at the World Championships and the Olympics.

As an athlete, Kirsch won two U19 World Championship Titles as a member of the German National Team. She won gold in the 4x- in 1995 and 2x in 1997. She also earned silver in the 2x at the U23 World Championships in 1998. In her collegiate career at Ohio State, Kirsch earned First Team All-American honors and was named Big Ten Co-Athlete of the Year as a senior in 2002 and was a three-time First Team All-Big Ten selection. She was named an Ohio State Scholar Athlete in 1999, 2001 and 2002. Kirsch was the first rower to be inducted into OSU's Athletics Hall of Fame.

Kirsch earned both her bachelor's degree in psychology and her master's degree in counseling education at Ohio State.

Michigan State University Athletics

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