United Row x Clemson Rowing Boat Naming Ceremony

You are invited to join Team United Row and the Clemson University Rowing Team on March 21st for the official boat naming and christening ceremony.

Join us as we celebrate their extraordinary achievement, unveil the new boat, and hear firsthand how two Clemson Tigers carried the values of teamwork, discipline, and courage across an ocean. Lunch will be provided.

• March 21, 2026
• Barbi H. Breimann Clemson Rowing Center – Clemson Rowing Boathouse
• Arrive – 10:30 AM
• Program Begins – 11:15 AM

Program includes: Talk and Q&A, christening of the boat, lunch & mingle.

Please RSVP using the form linked below.

About Anna and Jenny

Anna McLean Joynson (’17) and Jenny D’Anthony (’18) met at Clemson University where they became teammates, roommates, and best of friends. They competed on the varsity rowing team together all 4 years, and were teammates in the 1V8 junior and senior years.

Anna & Jenny rowed 2800 miles across the Pacific Ocean from California to Hawaii setting the world record as the youngest pair to ever complete the expedition in 47 days, 37 minutes, and 17 seconds. Prior to their historic feat, Anna also rowed across the Atlantic Ocean with her brother Cameron in 2019.

Team United Row is proud to be able to give back to their Alma Mater and the Clemson Rowing Team with the donation of a new racing boat. You can learn more about the duo at UnitedRow.us.

Clemson Alumnae Set World Record Rowing Across the Pacific—and Now They’re Giving Back

What began on Lake Hartwell as two determined Clemson rowers chasing seconds on a stopwatch became a world-record-breaking feat of endurance, grit, and heart.

Clemson alumnae Anna McLean Joynson ’17 and Jenny D’Anthony ’18, teammates, roommates, and best friends from the varsity rowing program, spent four years sharpening their resilience on Clemson’s Rowing Team. They didn’t know it then, but those early-morning practices were laying the foundation for a life changing adventure.

After several years in corporate life, both felt the same tug, there had to be more. Anna had already answered that call once, rowing across the Atlantic with her brother in 2019. But this time, the challenge would be even greater. Together, Anna and Jenny formed Team United Row, a name rooted in their belief that unity is the strongest force when conditions turn rough. In 2024, Team United Row set out to row 2,800 miles across the Pacific Ocean, from California to Hawaii, in a 24-foot boat named Axel Rose.

On June 8th, they pushed off from Monterey Bay to the breathtaking sight of whales surfacing alongside their gunwales. Within hours, that calm beauty was replaced by fierce headwinds that made holding their course a brutal fight. This was no college 2k sprint; there would be no finish line for weeks. Their world shrank to a space just five and a half feet wide, powered only by their bodies, their will, and the promise of forward progress.

Life aboard Axel Rose was raw and elemental. Two rowing positions. A watermaker. Solar panels. Compact lockers to hold their provisions and equipment. A tiny stern cabin barely big enough to sleep in. And outside, nothing but endless horizon. When equipment failed and weather shifted, they adapted. When bone-deep cold, salt sores, and exhaustion hit, they pushed. They rowed through the Great Pacific Garbage Patch for nearly a week. They endured the suffocating stillness of the doldrums. They shifted from each rowing 12 hours a day to 18 hours each. They found small ways to maximize every minute on the oars.

But in the midst of hardship, they uncovered joy, beautiful sunrises after weeks of gray, surfing down the face of rolling waves, singing until their voices cracked, and moments of complete, awe-struck silence. They learned to trust themselves. To trust each other. To persevere. To build momentum when none existed.

After 47 days, 37 minutes, and 17 seconds, Team United Row became the youngest pair in history to row across the Pacific Ocean. Their arrival in Hawaii, under a pitch-black sky illuminated only by torchlight and cheering loved ones, marked the end of a journey that transformed them both. Now, Anna and Jenny are returning to the place where their bond, and their belief in unity, began. In gratitude to their alma mater and the program that shaped them, Team United Row is donating a brand-new racing shell to the Clemson Rowing Team. Fittingly, the shell will carry the name United Row.

The duo hopes this boat becomes a symbol for future Clemson rowers, of unity in motion, of resilience when storms roll in, and of the strength that comes from pulling together with purpose.