Lorei and Romano then tried rowing. And surprise, surprise, look where they are now.
The Merion Mercy seniors will compete next week on the sport's biggest stage, the Henley Women's Regatta on the River Thames in England.
Soon after that, it'll be on to college - and rowing for NCAA Division I programs.
Lorei, who has rowed for four years, will compete for Stanford. Romano will take her three years of crew experience to Columbia.
What caused the athletic turnaround?
"It doesn't take a lot of talent to row," Romano said. "You just have to be strong."
Her coach, Mike Brown, wasn't nearly as blunt.
"The best thing about high school rowing is you don't have all these AAU rowing programs around the country from sixth, seventh, and eighth grade. So everybody is in the same boat when they start their freshman year," Brown said. "If you're an uncoordinated, dorky athlete, yeah, you can be really good, because it's probably not a coincidence that the harder you work, the faster you go.
"The sport requires balance, endurance, and power. You can get weight lifters in here, and they're not going to make the boat go fast just because they're strong."
Lorei and Romano are the lone seniors on the Henley-bound crew, and they will team with Emily Buongiorno, Elissa Jensen, and coxswain Maddie Ratfield in the varsity four at the famed, head-to-head competition.
Baldwin School also will row at the regatta, scheduled for June 17-19. St. Joseph's Prep and Malvern Prep boys will be in the Henley Royal Regatta two weeks later.
Merion's four is coming off last weekend's gold-medal performance at the Scholastic Rowing Association of America's national championships. The Golden Bears defeated E.L. Crossley, the Canadian crew that had beaten them a week earlier at the Stotesbury Cup Regatta, by more than four seconds.
