There are some things a rowing coach never wants to see.

This is one of them.

Everyone was okay. Shaken, chilled, and stirred.

But okay.

(The sound you can hear in the background is coxbox feedback, still working under water.)

Lesson learned, “Don’t drop those hands at the catch, boys.”

Peter sent this note along about an upcoming adventure:

How’s it going Mike!

I’m rowing across the Atlantic this winter in the following boat which is an ocean rowing boat with 8 sweep rowing positions - 4 on port, 4 on starboard. As one of the only river rowing people on the crew, the skipper has asked me to look at the rigging, I’m going to base the span on the span for a racing 8 (i.e. an Empacher). what do you think? can you help me on this?

Hey Peter:

First off, you’re nuts. Why would anyone want to row away from a perfectly good continent?

Second, good for you. Sounds like a cool thing to do (for you, not for me).

Continue Reading »

(photo by clevercupcakes)

With the Olympics blazing away it is an exciting time for rowing. And if you’re lucky you may just be able to view racing in person, on the web, or on TV. And possibly you can read about the training, selection, and coaching from a number of sources.

A word of caution—be careful what you learn.

The Olympics represent four years of a nation trying to make a boat go fast. It is our Indy 500. Our  Super-Bowl. To generate the hull speed needed to compete at that level the envelop is pushed—really pushed. Technological breakthroughs, advance training regimens, innovative equipment, and radical strategies and techniques are just a few of the outcomes of a country trying to get a boat to win a medal. However, many of those advances are not applicable to what us mere mortals can do with our rowing.

Do Big Advances Happen
No doubt—great advances happen in Olympic efforts. Obviously not all are good (doping) but some of the advances can be brilliant. As a recent Fast Company article details no holds are barred reaching for Olympics medals. Here are a few advances for the Beijing Olympics:

• a swim suit that constricts to makes athletes smaller—therefore faster
• a running shoe so light the runners do not know that it is on
• track shoes that list to port to help with speed when the track turns
• javelins made of aluminum wrapped in carbon, like a giant toothpick swaddled in a carbon-fiber fishnet stocking

At the 1996 Olympics, where I was boatman for the US team, I witnessed some incredible advances. From explosive reduction of erg scores, to blazing speeds, to wickedly high ratings, to new equipment designs—it was almost like being part of a science-fiction movie. The image below is a past example of one such innovation. It is a sliding rigger developed in 1956. (It was banned from racing by FISA after Kolbe won the World Championships in the single in 1981. Bad break for  all of those who had bought one.)

(photo from Friends of Rowing History)

We Are Mortal

Often those advances are viewed as what colleges, high schools, and juniors programs should be doing. And this is where problems, sometimes big problems can occur. Olympic innovation is big—scratch that—huge. And big budgets, big athletes, and nearly unlimited resources (for some teams) are dedicated to being faster, higher, stronger.

But that does not describe most rowing programs in the US.  Our athletes are not Oympic athletes. Our training schedules do not allow for Olympic efforts. Our rowers do not row as well as Olympians. And our equipment is not like theirs. It does not mean that the aspirations of the rowers are different, but the  materials and resources are.

Yet I see many coaches, rowers, and supporters believing that what Olympians can do, others can do.

As you tune in and watch Olympic rowing I suggest there are 6 things you ignore when it comes to trying them with your own rowing or coaching.

Ignore This—Speeds. Aw, come on. They are faster than us. They are WICKEDLY faster than us. Heck, some of them are faster than my car. Hardly any crews can come anywhere near close to those speeds. So don’t ask to go that fast. Don’t ask your teams to go that fast. (Don’t ask your car to go that fast.)

Ignore This—Training. Those folks train like the type of athletes they are—amazing. The work volume, scheduling, and consumption is incredible. (At one camp I saw a sculler eat a 32 egg omelette after practice, and complain about still being hungry.) They train hard, and if anyone but those athletes were to try to train at that level the consequences could be drastic and crushing. Training plans need to be methodically designed for the level of athlete you are (or have). Don’t try to do Olympic training.

Ignore This—Strategy. Granted this is one area where you might be able to draw some wisdom, but keep in mind that Olympic racing strategy is designed to work against Olympic competition and with Olympic athletes.  And to implement an Olympic rowing strategy you  have to be able to do the tactics. Tactics such as racing the first 700 meters at 45 spm is probably well beyond all but the best rowers in the world.

Ignore This—Stroke Rating. See above. Their hull speed allows for higher ratings. Speed and stroke rating go hand-in-hand.

Ignore This—Rigging Numbers. This is my pet peeve. The only rowers who should be rigged like national team rowers are national team rowers. Yet I get emails from coaches who use those rigging numbers and wonder why their kids are hurting their backs. In my rigging clinics I no longer use national team rigging numbers as examples. Get the appropriate numbers for your rowing. Don’t use theirs.

Ignore This—Equipment. All that shiny new equipment, flying down the course. Don’t you just want to buy some? Of course you do, but is it right for you? For your team? There is some wiggle room here, but you might not get the bang from the buck you want.

So what should a rowing spectator do? Turn on the Olympics. Watch. Cheer. Enjoy.

But just be careful what knowledge you bring home.

When one is big, and the other is small, what should you do?

I just recently received the following email from Patrick, about rigging for different size rowers.

Hi Mike,

I’m wondering, I’m trying to rig a double up for my partner and myself to race in. I’m 5′11” and he’s somewhere around 6′4”. We’re rowing in a Wintech double so the adjustments have been pretty easy so far.
I raised my seat to its highest potential and moved my stretchers about 1/2 in up, but our angles are still off, people have been telling me to move my pins in and his pins out but I am not sure how much is too much or how much is enough.
Was wondering if you could give me some insight on this. Hope to hear from you soon.

Patrick brings up one of the most frequently asked questions I get from rowers who really want to get the most from their equipment: “What if I am a different size from my partner, what can I/we do?” This is not an easy one to answer. However there are some steps he can take to find a solution that may work for you.

Continue Reading »

Rigging crazy—it’s the thing that happens to us (all of us) during the racing season. We go looking for that one-little-iota-of-speed—that 1/10th of a second that will make the difference between fame and famine, and whammo—Rigging Crazy hits

• “Two-seat you are washing out”—must be the pitch
• “Seven seat you are late at the catch” —must be the height
• “Look at the course of my coxswain”—has to be the spreads
• “Arggh! We lost by .4 seconds”—should have rowed the ultra-lights
• “Look at the splay angle of the sneakers”—that’s why there is a port-list Continue Reading »

Too often the straps we use to secure our rowing shells get abused to the point of revolt. The revolt can range from something small— such as getting all knotted, to something catastrophic—such as fraying or breaking at the worst possible moment.

Straps need TLA—tender loving attention. They don’t need a lot of it, but you have to give them some. If not, you WILL have a revolt. Guaranteed.

The video shows one simple thing you can do to prove to your strap that you love it, and help it be there for you when you need it. I call it the Page Roll. Rob Page was a coxswain of note for our team several years ago and he showed me this simple way to store our straps while at the same time checking them for problems (such as fraying) that could indicate the strap might fail at when you needed it most. (The audio may not work, so I’ve included notes below).

It is a fairly simple process:

Step 1: Unfurl the strap, and look it over for any frayed edges. If you see any the strap needs to be replaced, and DON’T use it. Let me be clear about that. It is a BAD (UNSAFE) strap. Get rid of it (for example . . . give it to an athlete for a belt).

Step 2: Take the end and slide it through the large opening of the cam. This is NOT the opening that the strap goes through to be tightened. Pull strap through about eight inches.

Step 3: Begin rolling the strap from the fold in in that is away from the cam buckle. Gentle, and tightly, roll it until you reach the cam.

Step 4: While holding the cam buckle against the roll, take the end that you put through the cam in step 2 and wrap it around the roll. Then put the end through the slot in the buckle. Gently tighten it up.

The strap will now stay neatly in a roll, ready for action when you are. A great benefit to this method is ease of storing. You can get numerous rolled straps in a small space.

Here is a question for you, (and I cannot wait for the comments).

If your focus is sweep rowing, and going fast, can sculling help you get faster?

I had my own opinion about this, but I wanted to search out others for their thoughts. I asked several friends who are rock-star coaches. I got several different responses back and the common theme that stuck out was, “it sure can!”

When I prompted one coach for more details she told me “Sculling can help with so many of the small intricacies of sweep rowing that the athlete dismisses as important when the call is loud and clear to PULL HARD.” Continue Reading »