Veronica Toro

The BIG truth is I have not gotten to where I am by myself... There has been an innumerable number of people along my path that have helped me in my professional, athletic, and personal accomplishments. When I was in high school I asked a trauma surgeon who came to give a talk at my school how he dealt with when patients died in his operating room. We spoke for a while and then he asked me to come shadow him in the operating room and the rest is history- I fell in love with surgery, he mentored me through the years and now I am a cardiac surgeon in training at Cedars Sinai. After joining the rowing team at MITI saw an article in a Puerto Rican newspaper about the Puerto Rico Rowing Federation so I contacted and I asked how I could become part of the tem. Eight years later, with the help of many coaches that trained and mentored me along the way, I qualified to the Tokyo Olympics as the first Puerto Rican female Olympic rower. The biggest thing I have learned from these experiences, and something I teach all of my mentees is to never be afraid to ASK - ask when you don’t know something, ask for help when you need it, ask for guidance to achieve your goals, ask because you are curious of something, ask so you can get to know people, ask so you can find opportunities for yourself. Coaching is my way of paying it forward for all those times someone answered yes in my path.