Rio Olympic silver medalist Katherine Grainger has been named a dame in this year’s British New Year’s Honor List. With five Olympic medals, Grainger is Great Britain’s most decorated female Olympian. This most recent honor recognizes her contributions to both sport and charity. Grainger is a board member of International Inspiration, a legacy initiative of London 2012; the British Olympic Association Athletes’ Commission; and London Youth Rowing, and has served as honorary patron or vice-patron of a several other charities. “This is an enormous honor and something I could never have imagined when I started my rowing career,” said Grainger.
FISA Turns 125
Rowing’s international governing body has a birthday coming up. On June 25, the Federation Internationale des Societies d’Aviron, also known as FISA, will celebrate the 125 mark. Founded in 1892—two years before rower and father of the modern Olympic movement Pierre de Coubertin founded the International Olympic Committee—FISA played a critical role in helping to standardize the sport, creating rules around international competition, instituting technical specifications for equipment, and dealing with the widespread corruption during rowing’s professional era. More recently, the governing body has focused on opening the sport to new audiences, including coastal rowers and para-athletes.
Go Row Indoor
British Rowing is aiming to double the number of indoor rowers in the already-mad rowing nation over the next five years. To aid in the effort, dubbed “Go Row Indoor,” they’re partnering with Concept2, who will serve as official performance rowing machine for the national federation. Other initiatives to raise indoor rowing’s profile in Great Britain include instructor training programs, the launch of online rowing leagues, and new class models for gyms and studios. “We look forward to working with British Rowing to achieve our goal of making the sport of rowing more accessible to everyone,” said Concept2 managing director Alex Dunne.
A Coach's Resolutions
We’ve all heard the statement, attributed to Albert Einstein: “Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.” All good coaches go through a period of reflection on what they did in the past year and think about doing something different. Even if you’ve had a good year, there’s always room for improvement. Doctor Rowing decided that this would be a good time to make some resolutions for 2017. Here they are:
Take more video. The time is long past when it was a nuisance to take video. The bulky camera and the battery that always seemed to be about to run out of juice have been replaced by our phone cameras or iPads. It doesn’t matter anymore if it is raining; it is so easy to slip said device under your jacket. It isn’t important to film a lot of strokes. Most rowers do the same thing in five strokes that they do over the course of a practice. I’ve always been well-intentioned about this, like I am about most of these resolutions, but I have not done it systematically enough in the past.
Show and watch more video. How often have I not carved out time to show my rowers this valuable teaching tool? Yes, it’s hard to come in off the water early in order to spend the time, and it always takes more time than it should—they ask questions, don’t they? There are some people who don’t seem to get much out of seeing video, but there are others who make gigantic leaps forward in technique after a video session. When I coached the U.S. lightweight women, we used to film all the seat racing and then leave the tapes where athletes could peruse them on their own time. They loved that. In some years, I have emailed video to kids. With today’s technology, it is easy to do a voiceover pointing things out.
Give a physiology talk. The hours in between practices at our preseason are perfect for a chalk talk where you can present the fundamentals of physiology and what each type of workout is designed to do. An athlete who knows what the advantages of low-intensity are work will be better equipped to do a good job. Knowledge is power. The USRowing coaching manual has a very good chapter from Kris Korzeniowski on this. Present it to your athletes.
Mentor younger coaches. There never seems to be enough time to sit down and explain things to your assistants. But they are incredibly valuable to your program. Make sure that they understand what you are looking for and why you teach what you do. It’s also very important to listen; you will learn from them, too.
Ride in the launch with someone from another program. I’ll admit that I used to do this a lot more frequently when I was younger. I learned an awful lot from observing other coaches, including how to treat athletes. There are a lot of things that need to be part of your coaching persona: patience, positive or negative feedback, intensity, humor, fun, scolding, technical instruction, understanding of differences stemming from different body types. You can learn a lot by watching.
Do more erg tests. This is probably my biggest weakness. I hate spending the time on land that is necessary for an erg test. There’s so much to do on the water, and my goal is always to get a boat to move faster. But people can learn from an erg test, too. It’s a good idea to schedule follow-up meetings with your athletes to go over the good, the bad, and the ugly.
Coach the coxswains. A former coxswain myself, I’m as guilty as anyone about not spending enough time with them. I do evaluations, asking the rowers to write out what they like about each ‘swain and what each one needs to improve in, and I follow up two weeks later asking if they have seen improvement. I’m pretty good about coaching them on the water, paying attention to their steering and their command of a crew. But there’s an awful lot to the job that needs to be discussed, and coxswain/coach lunches are worth their weight in gold.
Keep a better log. I start out with the best of intentions, as is true of all New Year’s resolutions, but sometime around week three I end up abandoning my secretarial role. My long-time assistant reminds me that I don’t really have to write them down. She will often say, “Tuesday after the first race, work on bringing the rating up. Right on schedule. You do this every year.” Although there is certainly an element of luck to that, it’s what needs to be done, and that’s why I’m always on it. But what exactly was that great steady state practice the day the kids were so tired? I wish I knew.
Enjoy being out on the water with great motivated kids. The one thing I always do and never need a reminder. What an awesome job I have!
Mountain Time
Climbing up to the birthplace of extreme skiing—New Hampshire’s Tuckerman’s Ravine—was my way of closing out 2016. Nestled in the White Mountains of New Hampshire, on the back side of the East’s largest and deadliest mountain, Mount Washington, the 2.4-mile ascent doesn’t let up until you reach the shelter, nicknamed HoJo’s, at the base of the ravine. It’s anywhere from a 90-minute to two-and-a-half-hour trek depending on weather, fitness, and mindset. My friend Seth and I were handed a tough, but magical New Year’s Eve day: 20 inches of new snow and a deadline from our wives to get up and down before the kids were done with breakfast.
Seth and I only saw a handful of adventurers along the way—some with smiles on their faces, all a bit beaten by the mountain. We made a few stops, but pushed through tough sections and numb hands motivated by what we hoped to see at the top. When we finally emerged above treeline the view of Tuckerman’s melted the cold, the pain, and the burn we had endured. Our time of one hour and 37 minutes wasn’t too bad either. After a quick change of gear, a few photos, and the two-mile powdery ski down, all I could think of was wanting to go back up again. This day also unexpectedly set me up for my winter training. It gave me the goal to make it to HoJo’s in one hour and 20 minutes and then ski Tuckerman’s ravine when I return this April. In order to do so, I will regularly be incorporating the below two workouts—one for strength, one for cardio—into my training.
The Workout:
Power Player
Repeating this circuit will build muscle endurance needed for repeated efforts such as in hiking and skiing. Add sets as you get stronger.
15 jump squats
30 mountain climbers
15 burpees with a push-up
15 tricep dips
20 single leg lunges (10 each side)
10 pull-ups
Cardio Crusher
The goal here is to build endurance and mimic the steeps and flatter sections of a climb.
Ten minutes of easy rowing and then go five minutes medium, five minutes hard. Recover for three minutes and repeat two to four times, envisioning summiting the mountain as you approach the midsection of the last piece.
World champion rower Josh Crosby is an international fitness presenter, coach , and co-developer of group fitness programs IndoRow and ShockWave. www.JoshCrosbyFitness.com
On the Edge
Concept2’s vortex edge has two key design features: a smooth round edge (compare this to the sharp corners of a normal blade); and small triangular devices designed to swirl the water as it flows by, making it stick more closely to the surface of the blade. This has a positive effect only during the first part of the drive, when the water flow approaches the blade at a flat angle toward the edge. At this point, the blade is traveling in a forward-sideward path relative to the water. After that, the blade at first moves backward and creates drag before it travels again forward-sideward, now back toward the boat when the part of the blade with the vortex edge becomes the trailing edge.
So theoretically there are compelling reasons to use the vortex edge. But measuring its effectiveness is another matter.
I tried to measure the difference by running tests with identical sculls, one set with the edge, one other without. The differences in force patterns and times rowed over certain distances ended up being as large as the variations you see when you repeat trials. The difference is also so minimal that, when blindfolded, rowers can’t tell the two apart. But even if the advantage is not entirely clear, there are practical benefits to the device: protecting the blade edge from physical damage.
The Art of the Start
The impending arrival of the scholastic racing season doesn’t leave a lot of time to work on one of the most critical aspects of a sprint race: the start. To get up to speed quickly, try building starting sequence drills into your workouts. Add in 20-stroke accelerations at quarter slide and then half slide every five minutes during steady state. Push the envelope on these short pieces by aiming for stroke rates as high as 50. Focus on release timing and precise blade depth.
Flying or moving starts are also good to incorporate into long-distance training.
When the boat is already moving, row directly into your starting sequence. This will allow you to practice multiple starts without becoming overly fatigued or cold from sitting up for long periods of time during standing starts. Incorporate starts into daily practices so they become second nature to your crew. Begin every training piece with a start and when your crew is rowing intervals settle to your target stroke rate after a complete start sequence. During long rows, a flying start is just the thing to get heads back into the boat and your boat swinging together.
Rules of Extraction
When a certain unnamed but blunt-speaking international coach (use your imagination) first arrived in the U.S. to lead the national teams, he complained colorfully about the athletes’ poor releases, taking the greatest issue with how hurried the Americans were to extract their blades from the water. One theory was it stemmed from a fear of crabbing at the finish. That fear, however, not to mention the weak finish that results from such a timid approach, can be overcome by focusing on the feather. Have your rowers draw the handle level roughly to the bottom of the rib cage.
The draw—more of a squeeze—should stop short of touching the body.
Only then should the feathering motion begin. Emphasize to those who are worried their blade could get stuck in the water that the slip of the blade results in a hollow behind it. A strong draw is required to create this effect. From there, the downward motion of the outside hand and the rolling of the inside hand happen together for a clean extraction of the blade. For a clean catch, the inside hand should roll the blade square over the toes so that it is prepped for entry and the bottom edge is just off the water.
