When it comes to rowing, the premise is more simple than most sports. Ultimately, it's you, a boat, your teammates and the water — and that's what Gonzaga rower Kailee Jackson knows best.
 
A Kappolei, Hawaii native, who grew up just outside of Honolulu, Jackson hadn't rowed in the way that she does now at GU, where she's entering her second year on the varsity crew. But she said she's always felt a connection to the ocean — growing up body surfing on Oahu, playing water polo and watching her older brother paddle before her made that a no-brainer. She just didn't realize how indispensable paddling on the open ocean would become until she tried it.
 
"I was obsessed with it when I started it," she said. "I joined every possible season. I pretty much paddled year round."
 
Perhaps this was because her talent was evident from the onset, when she joined the club as an eighth-grader — a year earlier than most. Her high school coach, David Ahia, said Jackson's maturity was evident in her rapid growth as a paddler.
 
"Every race that I put her in, the worst she's done is fourth place," he said. "Usually I work with girls for one to four years, but since she started in eighth grade, I think she's the one most accomplished paddlers I've had."
 
Canoe paddling is the state sport of Hawaii, and there is no place where its popularity is stronger. A single-hull waa (canoe) and a wooden hoe (paddle) intimate a connection to the more intransigent parts of the islands' cultural fabric. The boats may be fiberglass now, but the sight of canoes sliding across the ocean is ever present from the beaches of Oahu.
 
"A lot of the things that we still do in Hawaii are a lot of what the ancestors wanted," Ahia said. "They try to keep it relevant to how they rigged and put their canoes in the water."
 
As Jackson advanced, the races got longer. Her senior year, Jackson raced the 18-mile Queen Liliuokalani Canoe Race in Kona, the world's largest outrigger canoe race, named after the last reigning Hawaiian monarch. Her team finished 29th overall against competition with decades of experience.
 
But even Liliuokalani pales in comparison to Na Wahine O Ke Kai — a team paddling race spanning 42 miles from Molokai to Oahu through the Ka Iwi Channel, known as "The Channel of Bones" (Ka iwi itself means "the bone" in Hawaiian). Matthew Dekneef of Hawaii Magazine described the journey itself as "a reminder that, when one's physicality is stripped away and tested, our ka iwi is truly all we are." 
 
The open ocean's grueling demands give validity to the race's claim as one of the most prestigious of its kind in the world. Twenty to 30-foot swells are not uncommon, and the stretch of ocean is notoriously fickle, even as paddlers reach the final leg where the looming visage of Diamond Head emerges in the distance.
 
For the first 25 years of the race's existence, the race was restricted solely to males. But by 1979, when 17 all-women crews pushed out into the channel for the first time, the race had become the first to represent the entirety of the sport's growing local base of constituents.
 
"In Hawaii, they call it the Superbowl of canoe paddling because you have teams coming from all over the world," said Ahia, who's raced in it himself multiple times since the mid-90's. "It was one of my dreams to take a high school girl's team and coach them across the channel."
 
Paddlers row in groups of six in the boat at a time, each rowing 30 minutes off and 20 minutes on (although in Jackson's case, she was doing double duty at times). Teams are composed of 12 members though, so they switch places occasionally, being brought from another boat to climb in and out, treading in the open ocean while trying to preserve the boat's momentum all at the same time. This is known as a water change.
 
"It's crazy," said Jackson, who raced Ka Iwi twice, finishing second in the junior division and 24^th overall with a time of 6.34:02 as her best result. "Because you're in the middle of this channel that's 2000 feet deep. You don't know how far you are, and it's super rough and choppy."
 
"It can be scary," she admits, "but it's definitely so fun."
 
By this point, there was no disputing that for Jackson, a canoe and paddle had become second-nature. A captain of the team by her sophomore year, she came up second in the conference her junior season en route to the HHSAA State Championships, where she finished fifth — with a time just a hair over 4 and a half minutes. After a similarly successful senior year, Jackson earned the 2019 HMSA Kaimana Award, given to Hawaii student-athletes who not only shine in the classroom and playing field, but also in their communities. 
 
But the lack of any collegiate canoe paddling program meant she had to adapt her skill set for a new sport if she wanted to replicate the structure she had grown close to. Gonzaga, with a reputation for high-level academics and a women's program that was known for rewarding the hard work of walk-on rowers, felt like it checked all the boxes. She'd just have to be willing to trade in the Pacific Ocean for Silver Lake.
 
"I joined with the intent of having sports keep me grounded through my academics and stuff, and I also wanted to continue that team aspect," she said. "And it's the same thing when you're in a boat with somebody. You're putting in the work together to move forward as one." 
 
Naturally, she felt comfortable on the water, but growing accustomed to the nuances and specifics of a rower's skill set took some time. 
 
"She was always looking to get faster and more technical on the water," said GU assistant coach Claire Manthey. "The coaching staff started by convincing her that she was going to get better and that it was going to take some time to get to the level she wanted."
 
Sure enough, as spring came around, Manthey said she noticed rapid improvements in Jackson's speed on the ergometer and technique on the lake. As a result, Jackson began gradually getting mixed into boats with more experienced rowers so she could become accustomed to the speed.
 
"In addition to already being fast with an even higher ceiling of potential, [she's] an even more integral part of our team due to her attitude and demeanor at practice," first-year GU head coach Andy Derrick said, evocative of similar sentiments from Ahia when he first began coaching her himself. "She shows up with a willingness to push herself outside her comfort zone and to push those around her." 
 
When the spring racing season was cancelled due to COVID, it meant Jackson would have to wait longer than expected for a validation of that progress. Or even, in some cases, just a chance to be on the water again.
 
 "I'm so excited," she said of the upcoming race season, remembering the abruptness of those swift cancellations in March. "I feel like we were deprived of any kind of competition. We worked so hard to get where we were."
 
But even when races resume, a sprint on the lake is still understandably difficult to compare to open-ocean competitions back home. 
 
"Paddling ones at home are really special," Jackson said, remembering massive opening ceremonies before racing — Hawaiian chanting, prayer, singing, a blessing that takes place for all the competitors, and sometimes even some hula.
 
"All of it gives paddling races a lot of purpose and meaning to me."
 
In both disciplines, there's theoretically always a place you're trying to get — that's the primary objective. But most would say that's not really the point of why they do it. Thousands of paddlers don't sign up to race the Channel of Bones just to get to Oahu. 
 
As Jackson intimates, there's something more arresting about the experience, regardless of what type of boat you're in — something that transpires on the water that doesn't anywhere else.
 
The tangible in the distance, plenty of miles to go, with all the parts moving as one.