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Our Coaches

Chris Flynn

Director of Operations & Competitive Masters Head Coach

Chris has an extensive history in the rowing community. He began rowing as a junior with Woodbridge High School and the Occoquan Boat Club (USRowing Sculling Camp at the time) and continued on to row with George Mason University and The University of Melbourne Boat Club. Upon returning to the U.S., he moved to Boston to train as a lightweight development athlete. Eventually, he settled into the newly forming Community Rowing Inc. (CRI) and later moved on to join Cambridge Boat Club.

He has 30+ years of successful competitive training and racing experience with notable performances at the Australian University Games in 1996 and at USRowing Club Nationals in 1999 and 2000. In 2012, he helped lead Cambridge Boat Club to an overall team points trophy and men's team points trophy win at the USRowing Masters Nationals regatta.

Chris has also been the Club Captain at CRI and Cambridge Boat Club, the Regatta Director for the CRI Headless Halloween Regatta and the CBC Invitational Regatta and volunteered extensively with the Head of the Charles Regatta.

As a coach, Chris has worked at Woodbridge High School, Hylton High School, Prince William Rowing Association, Community Rowing Inc., and Santa Clara University and has coached athletes from the junior through to the masters level. He is a USRowing Level 2 Certified Coach.

Outside of rowing, Chris worked for a number of years as an institutional investment manager with State Street Global Advisors and later as a private wealth manager with Atlantic Trust Private Wealth Management. In 2013, he relocated to the San Francisco Bay area with his wife and two kids and began volunteering within the Palo Alto community.

If you'd like to learn more about the BIAC Competitive Team, click here and come join a session. If you have questions about BIAC, email Chris here.

Jenifer Aguirre

Open Masters Head Coach

Jenifer has over 25 years experience as a personal trainer and 17 years as a rowing coach for both high school athletes and adults. She walked on to the sport at UCSB as a Freshman and never looked back, rowing all four years on the Lightweight team culminating in a National Championship medal.

Rowing is truly a passion for her and she is thrilled to pass that along to young athletes and masters looking to take their skills to the next level. Her main goal is to help each rower not only discover their own strengths, passions and potential but explore this unique sport. As a coach, she has achieved State and Regional Champion success with her masters and junior teams.

As a collegiate and masters rower herself, she has enjoyed Regional and National Champion success as well as participating in several Masters World Championships in places like Belgium and Canada, and collected a couple of coveted Head of the Charles medals along the way.

Jenifer’s philosophy for both rowing and health and fitness encompasses mind, body and soul. She believes you must understand where your fitness and skill level is, where you want it to go, and how it got there. Her passion and inspiration come from "helping others to achieve goals they did not think were possible, whether it be in the gym, on the water, or in life." Both her coaching and personal training style revolve around form and function, and exercise variety. "As you rise to the challenge, the higher the bar goes."

Jenifer is the Open Crew Head Coach. As a teacher and coach, she has a gift for inspiring a love for rowing and motivation to excel.

If you'd like to learn more about the BIAC Open Team, click here and come join a session.

Derek Stedman

Open Masters Assistant Coach

Derek started rowing in 8th grade. He tried out for the team in middle school, and got sucked in forever. He won at Royal Canadian Henley in the senior men's lightweight double in 2011 and in the senior men's lightweight pair in 2013. The win in 2013 was particularly sweet, as it topped off a hard-fought return from injury and illness in the fall university season for both his pair partner and him.

Off the water, Derek is an engineer specializing in wind related catastrophe modeling. In his spare time, he's taken up cycling racing, and found himself on the podium a few times recently. When asked what his favorite candy bar is, he says "poutine".

Derek infuses his coaching with a deep understanding of the sport, and an elegant Star Wars philosophy. He has been known to transform five-and-glides into something akin to Jedi exercises with the Force ("an energy field created by all living things. It surrounds us, penetrates us, and binds the galaxy together."--Jedi Master Obi Wan-Kenobi, 1977)

Chuck Bonnici

Novice Masters Head Coach, Head of Adaptive Program

Chuck started rowing for Serra Crew in high school, where he competed in local and national regattas, and has been involved in rowing ever since. He began by coaching Junior rowers at Serra and Los Gatos, then served as an assistant Masters coach at BIAC for both the Novice and Open teams. In 2014, Chuck stepped into the role as Novice Head Coach for BIAC masters. 

Beginning in 2021, Chuck also took over as the Adaptive Head Coach at BIAC. He coaches adaptive athletes at all levels and many of them participate in the Everbody Rows (eRos) program coached by Chuck. If you have questions about adaptive rowing OR would like to volunteer during an adaptive practice, click here to email Chuck directly to get started!

In addition to coaching masters novices, Chuck competes in Masters rowing events.

Amanda Hawkins

Learn to Scull, Daylight Crew & Coastal Rowing Coach

Amanda joined Bair Island Aquatic Center in 2012 and began coaching in 2019. She spent a few seasons coaching juniors at Norcal Crew and eventually stepped into coaching roles at BIAC. After she started coastal rowing in 2018, she was eager to share the fun and helped start a coastal program at BIAC. She has now competed in four Coastal World Championships and enjoys teaching flat-water rowers how fun waves can be. When the waves are calmer, she can be found teaching new rowers how to scull and have confidence in a single.

She started her rowing career at UCSD back in college, then pursued her passion for rowing at BIAC. As a masters rower, Amanda has won gold at regattas including Canadian Henley Masters, US Rowing’s Masters National Championships and Head of the Lake and finished highly at Head of the Charles, San Diego Crew Classic, Masters Worlds and Coastal World Championships among others.

In between training, rowing and coaching, Amanda uses her degree in Computer Art & Design to work as a freelance graphic designer and marketing contractor. She volunteers her skills at BIAC as a newsletter editor, webteam member, and digital media coordinator. Spending much of her time playing with fonts and updating websites, she can passionately talk about good design in equal measure with rowing stories.

For the Serra Junior rowing program, see Serra Crew Coaches.

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