Jillian Behrens joined the Saint Mary’s Rowing staff prior to the start of the 2023-2024 season, after serving as the lead coach of the Saint Louis Rowing Club’s women’s varsity team for two years, during the 2021-2022 and 2022-2023 seasons. In her first year, the team and its Varsity 8+ secured a third place finish at USRowing’s Midwest Regionals in 2022, improving from the previous year’s eighth place finish and qualifying the team for USRowing’s Youth Nationals, where they placed 16th.
In her second and last year as lead coach for SLRC, the team and its Varsity 8+ took second place at Midwest Regionals in 2023, defeating the defending Youth National Champions, the Chicago Rowing Foundation. In that same year, the team won the 2v4+ event, marking their first varsity category win since 2018.
Behrens’ goal as lead coach was to incorporate effective training and tapering strategies utilizing a combination of drills, steady state or race pieces, along with strength and conditioning workouts to implement each athlete's skills while fostering team cohesion and ability to tow together for overall team success.
During Behrens’ collegiate days, she rowed at the University of California, Berkeley, and was a part of their rowing team for two years before her career was interrupted and ultimately ended by the onset of Covid during her junior and senior years at Berkeley. In 2018 as a freshman, she assisted the team in qualifying for NCAAs by placing 2nd in the 3v8+ category. The team then went on to win the NCAA Division 1 Rowing Team Championship that same year. The following year, she helped the Bears win bronze in the Varsity 4+ at the Pac-12 Championships and served as an alternate at NCAAs, where the team placed 6th.
Behrens is from St. Louis, Missouri. She graduated from Berkeley in 2021 with a degree in Art History. In addition to coaching at Saint Mary’s, she also serves as an assistant coach over the summer at the month-long junior racing camp Ready Set Row, which focuses on developing athletes’ mental toughness, in addition to their physical fitness and technical proficiency. In 2023, RSR won USRowing’s Summer Nationals Team Championship along with eight individual National Championship titles.
