Rowing in Oklahoma City

A couple of years ago, we met an amateur rowing team at a party.  I'd seen boats out on the Oklahoma river, which you cross to get to the city from Norman, but hadn't realized that it was a bonafide rowing place, one that people formed teams to row in.  This article in the New York Times explains why the river is good enough to host Olympic trials:

Knopp, a rowing enthusiast, looked at one 2,000-meter stretch that was perfectly straight and realized the Army Corps of Engineers had unwittingly created an ideal location for a boat race.

The memory of boathouses on the Charles (in Boston) makes me think would be so cool to have an OU boathouse on the river.  Although having a sailing club at Lake Thunderbird hasn't prompted me to take up sailing, so why would a boathouse prompt me to take up rowing?