The Wolverine: Covering University of Michigan Football and Sports
Issue link: https://comanpub.uberflip.com/i/1273784
AUGUST 2020 THE WOLVERINE 15 INSIDE MICHIGAN ATHLETICS Michigan rowing senior Annika Hoff- mann, a native of Geelong, Australia, was willing to go anywhere in the world to find what she was looking for: a com- bination of world-class academics and high-level athletics. "My father had always told me, 'Don't go to the place where you think you should go, go to the place where you know you'll be able to spend four years and be happy,'" Hoffmann recalled. "And as soon as I set foot on campus, I just knew that this was the place that I had to go to." She capped off an impressive fresh- man campaign in 2018 with a silver medal as a member of the second var- sity eight boat at the Big Ten Champion- ships and then helped the same boat row to a fourth-place finish at the NCAA Championships. "I was so dumbfounded by how well I did, and was feeling so happy that I'd been part of this team and that I'd been able to contribute to it," she said. "But I went through a summer of thinking about what I wanted my contribution to be throughout the whole time [at Michi- gan], and how to make my performance sustainable. "I still haven't quite gotten to the point where I think that I'm doing everything I possibly could. There's always more to give." Hoffmann is seemingly never satisfied, either, no matter what she or her team has accomplished. She has improved each season on the water and in her most recent season — 2019, because the 2020 campaign was canceled — was an NCAA medalist, helping the first var- sity eight place third nationally. But arguably more impressive have been her improvements, and achieve- ments, in the classroom, another area of life in which she's grown and succeeded immensely due to her insatiable men- tality. Hoffmann has been named a Big Ten Distinguished Scholar, Academic All-Big Ten honoree and CRCA Scholar-Athlete twice each, and became the program's first-ever CoSIDA Academic All-Amer- ican when she earned a second-team honor this spring. At the 2019 NCAA Championships, she received the Elite 90 Award for her 4.0 GPA. "I was just brought up to be really cu- rious and to think about things," Hoff- mann said. "That's served me well in the classroom, because I don't really con- sider the grade to be the most impor- tant thing — I consider it to be think- ing deeply about what I'm learning and putting everything into the tasks that I'm doing." Hoffmann is pursuing a dual degree in what she calls an "odd combination" — comparative literature and political sci- ence. Of course, she has solid reasoning for why she chose those areas of study. "I'm a fluent German speaker from my mother and I've spent nine years learn- ing French," she said. "It seemed a waste to not continue with that. "And then, I'm really passionate about political science research, especially in the field of climate policy, but also studies on authoritarianism. That's my main focus at the moment, and I want to bring that, hopefully, into a law degree later on." Heading into her senior year of college and last season of rowing at U-M, Hoff- mann has a newfound perspective after last season was taken away due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The rowing team won't take the next one for granted if it does indeed occur. "Knowing something and having it taken away are two different things," Hoffmann said. "I think missing out on this season has really made us so aware of just how lucky we are, because usu- ally we have this privilege — not just of doing the things we love, but also rep- resenting this amazing university, and I really miss it." When her time as an undergraduate student-athlete in Ann Arbor is over, she'll likely commit to something else — law school, perhaps, as she mentioned. After that, it'll be something even bigger, and then the pattern is likely to continue. "Recently, I've been thinking a lot about passion and giving everything to something," Hoffmann said. "I've heard a lot of people say that once they gradu- ate from college and are no longer on a team like that, they find it really hard to navigate life without that sense of burn- ing passion for what they do. "For me, the most important thing will be to realize that I can decide what I care about, and if I care about something, I should commit to it 100 percent, be- cause that's what makes it worthwhile. "It's not the outcome from the thing you're doing, it's what you put into it, and the hard work you put into it along the way, that makes the difference. And it makes the difference for everyone around you." — Clayton Sayfie Hoffmann, a native of Geelong, Australia, was named the Michigan rowing program's first- ever Academic All-American in 2020. PHOTO COURTESY MICHIGAN PHOTOGRAPHY Student-Athlete Of The Month Rowing Senior Annika Hoffman