Month: April 2014

Coxing How To Q&A Racing

Question of the Day

By

I coxed a race last weekend and was told that while my coxing was good, it sounded more like a piece than an actual race. Can you give some tips on how to really up the intensity while coxing a race? I thought I was communicating a sense of urgency pretty well through my tone, but I’m not sure if it came across as well as I had hoped. Thanks! Your blog has been an absolute godsend since this is my first year coxing.

I’ve done that too, mainly during scrimmages or heats if we’re comfortably beating the other crew or already sitting in a qualifying position. I don’t think there’s anything wrong necessarily with coxing races like that but it obviously depends on the race and your crew. For me, I always talked to my crews and established that for any race but the final, if we were ahead by a large enough margin that we could afford to back off a bit, I was going to tone down my coxing to a steady state level and they would follow suit with their rowing. There’s obviously a lot of other things that go into this but the goal was to make sure we were leaving enough in the tanks for the finals so we could go hard for the entire piece, regardless of the margins. One of the things that I’ve worked hard on over the years is getting my crews to match the intensity of their strokes to the intensity of my voice (…or vice versa, I never really have figured out which one it is).

Related: Since were still waiting for the river to be ice-free, I’ve been thinking about what I need to work on when we get back on the water. I’ve decided that coxing steady state pieces are harder for me to cox. I think it’s because I don’t want to talk too much but I’m also scared of not saying enough or being too repetitive. Do you have advice for coxing steady state workouts?

In the post linked above from a couple weeks ago I talked about the “coxing intensity scale” (which is now officially a real thing…) and where I usually fall on it depending on what we’re doing. “On the coxing intensity scale where 1 is your warmup and 10 is a race, I’m usually around a 6 (relaxed but focused tone) for the majority of each piece. I’ll bring it up to a 7.5-8 when calling 5s, 10s, and 20s though so that the rowers stay engaged and alert (and I don’t die of boredom) and then when it comes down to the last 6k, 2k, or whatever I’ll try to cox it like an actual race (somewhere between an 8.5 and a 9).” Think back to your most recent steady state piece during practice and rate yourself – where would you fall on that scale? Now think about your race. Rate yourself and then ask your crew to rate you. See how your numbers and their numbers compare to how you rated yourself during a steady state piece. This should give you a good comparison so you can get an idea of how the crew viewed your coxing during the race. I’ve definitely had races before where I thought I was coxing them really well and then we got off the water and they’ve said “you could have pushed us harder”. Talking to them though and getting feedback on how they interpreted my calls, my tone of voice, what they want/need, etc. was always the first step for me in the “do something different” process. Your first year or so of coxing is always a big test of your communication skills – the best thing you can do for yourself if you think your coxing didn’t come across as intended is to find out why.

When you put all of that stuff together, that’s what will help increase the intensity of your pieces. Intensity isn’t just about being loud or being aggressive. If “intensity” were a tangible object, like an onion or something, your volume and tone would only be the two outermost layers. Underneath all of that are the calls you’ve created, the “insider knowledge” on each of your rowers, what you know about technique, strategy, etc., in addition to all the other skills you’ve been practicing. When you combine all of that with a more-aggressive-and-at-times-louder-than-usual tone, that is what creates a sense of intensity in the boat. For more on that, definitely check out the posts in the “tone of voice” tag.

Related: My rowers told me after practice today that I should focus on the tone of my voice and not be so “intense” during our practices. I don’t really know how to fix that actually. Like I don’t think I am so “intense” but rather just firm and trying to be concise with the command I give out. They said that they really like how I cox during a race piece because my intensity level fits the circumstances. But they also said that if I cox in a similar tone to race pieces, they can’t take me seriously during the races. But my problem when I first started coxing was not being firm enough and getting complaints about how I should be more direct on my commands. Now when I am, my rowers say this. I don’t really know what is the happy medium. Like I listen to coxing recordings and I feel like I am doing fairly similar tones.

Also check out the post linked above. Although the question that was being asked is the opposite of what you’re asking, what I said in my reply definitely applies here. Another thing that really helps with the intensity during races (or any hard piece) is making sure you’re projecting your voice rather than just yelling. Listen to some recordings too – there are some great examples of what “good” intensity in the majority of the ones I’ve posted.

How to cox a seat race

Coxing How To Racing Teammates & Coaches

How to cox a seat race

By

I’ve talked a bit about seat racing before but haven’t ever gone over how coxswains fit into the picture. Our role is very limited in what we’re allowed to do but at the same time we have the ability to drastically effect the outcome of a race, more often for the negative than the positive.

Seat racing day is usually one where tensions run very high for the rowers, especially when the seats being decided are for the top boat, a big regatta, etc. The number one responsibility of the coxswain is to be impartial and ensure that the races are run fairly. The coaches and rowers (most especially the rowers…) rely on us to not overstep our boundaries or give anyone an unfair advantage over another rower and it’s our job to put personal preferences, friendships, etc. aside and let the rowers determine who wins the seat.

Related: Words

There are a lot of factors that go into seat racing but this post is just about the responsibilities of the coxswain on race day.

Things you SHOULD do

DO meet with the coach(es) before practice to go over the logistics for the day. Have your notebook handy so you can write down whatever instructions the coaches give you. The most important details you need to find out are what the warm up is (it may or may not be different than your usual one but whatever it is, both coxswains must do the same exact thing), where you’ll be meeting to start the piece, and the starting time of the first race. You should treat this like any regular race day where you have to be locked onto your stake boat 2 minutes prior to your race. Don’t put yourself (or your crew) in a position where you have to frantically get up to the starting line.

DO find out how the lane-switching will work. Typically you switch back and forth so that each crew has an equal opportunity to race in both lanes – consider this nothing more than quality control to ensure the fairness of each piece. It’s important for you to know what lane you’ll be starting in and which one you’ll be switching into at the end of each piece and then for you to actually do that before you get to the starting line.

DO know the length of the rest time following each piece and what the centers are. Centers are the amount of time between the starting time of each race. For example, if your coach says that you’ll be running on 30 minute centers starting at 2:30pm, that means the first race is at 2:30pm, the second is at 3pm, the third at 3:30pm, etc. Assuming you’re doing 1000m pieces that take four minutes to do, that means the amount of time you have between when you finish your race and when you need to be back up at the starting line to begin the next one is 26 minutes. At the end of each piece there will be a rest period where you’ll weight enough and the rowers can get water and make their switches. You (ideally) won’t know who is switching in and out until the coaches tell you but in the grand scheme of things, that’s irrelevant. All you need to do is keep an eye on the time.

DO be quick and efficient about pulling the boats together so the rowers can switch boats. If this isn’t something you’ve done before, try practicing it with another coxswain if you find yourselves sitting around not doing anything while you wait for your coach to get out. It’s really not that hard to do but you can’t spend five minutes trying to do it either. The easiest way to do it is for you to gently point your bow towards the other crew and the row over to them (lightly by pairs). Stop when the bow pairs oars are close enough to the stern pair of the other crew that they can reach out, grab the blade, and pass it back to their bow pair. The two crews can then lift their oars up and pull them across the shells to bring the boats together. Check out the video below of some UCLA fours seat racing to see how the coxswains bring the crews together. (If it doesn’t start automatically, skip ahead to the 7:00 mark.)

DO carry your notebook, pen/pencil, wrench, some spare band aids, and maybe some extra spacers out on the boat with you, just in case. If it’s a particularly hot day, also consider carrying a spare water bottle with you to give to the rowers if they run out.

DO know what you are and aren’t allowed to say. 99.999999999% of the time, coxswains aren’t (and shouldn’t be) allowed to say anything more than the stroke rate and the time/distance. If during a normal sprint racing you are talking 98% of the time, during a seat race you should be silent 98% of the time. When I’ve coxed seat races I would tell the crew the stroke rate every 30-45 seconds, point out 250, 500m, and 750m, and let the crew know the time (i.e. 1 minute down, 2 minutes down, etc.). All of that was regulated by the coach too – I didn’t just randomly decide to say those things or when to say them, I was told to give that information and only that information at specific times during the piece (usually 1000m pieces). You cannot cox them at all. No motivation, no technique, no moves, nothing. In the boat, the most important thing you have to stay on top of is making sure the stroke rate stays consistent and doesn’t surpass whatever cap the coach has given you. If the cap is no lower than 28spm and no higher than 30spm, it’s your job to communicate with your stroke if he/she is under or over that. The only thing you can do to get the stroke rate back in that range if it’s outside of it is to keep reading off the numbers until they get it where it needs to be. You can’t cox or coach them on how to get it there. (In any other situation you should not do this. Seat racing is the only time when reading off stroke rates like this is OK.)

DO write down the times/stroke rates from your cox box during the rest period if your coach asks you to.

DO consult with the coach at the end of practice to go over the results. Be objective with what you say too – remember, your number one responsibility is to ensure the fairness of the races. Give them feedback on how each boat moved with the addition and removal of each of the rowers and also let them know if anything happened that might have effected the outcome. This includes steering issues (i.e. having to steer to avoid hitting a log in the water, just steering poorly on that piece, etc.), a crew rowing outside the rate cap, not being even at the start, etc. If you steered poorly you must be honest about it and say that you didn’t hold a good point on the third piece so that the coach can factor that into the results if necessary. If your crew lost a close race but you fail to mention that you also steered an entire lane off of where you should have been, you might have just cost that rower their seat in the boat.

DO steer straight and stay in your lane. This is a great opportunity for you to really focus on holding and maintaining a point in a race situation because you’re going to spend the majority of the piece not talking, thus you have little to nothing to distract you.

DO communicate with the other coxswain(s). This is important on a normal day but it’s even more important when you’re seat racing. Keep the crews together, start your warm ups together, etc. There are few things more irritating to a coach than telling his coxswains to stay together only to get out there and see one crew rowing up in lane 1 and the other rowing up in lane 5 or one crew three lengths ahead of the other. Another thing you need to communicate on is maintaining the spacing between the crews. If you’re in your own lanes and steering straight this shouldn’t be an issue but you need to get any issues like this squared away before you start rowing down to the starting line. Most of the time you just row into these pieces rather than taking a start, which means coming down to the starting line together so you can both cross the line together, at the same time, is critical. If the two crews don’t start at the same time then the validity of the piece is now in question. If you’re rowing down and see that your crew is half a length ahead with 100m to the line, don’t be a jerk and force the other crew to power it up just to get even with you. Either tell your crew to back off or throw in a pause or two until you’re even. If you’re the coxswain of the crew that’s down, do whatever you’ve gotta do to get your crew even. Call over to the other coxswain to lighten up and then get on your crew to pull you up next to them.

Things you SHOULDN’T do

DO NOT give the rowers any information about how they did, how the piece felt, where the boat finished, how the coach made his final decisions, etc. ever (unless the coach has given you expressed permission to do so … which they probably won’t). This includes on the water, after practice, next month, etc. Fair, objective, and impartial, remember? This means not giving the rowers any indication that they did better or worse than someone else. They can see where they finish, they know how the boat feels, thus they can come to their own conclusions on how they did. If the coach wants them to know any of that info then they can tell themselves when they let them know the final results. The bottom line is don’t say or do anything that could compromise the integrity of the practice.

Feel free to comment below with any do’s and/or don’ts that you think coxswains should know regarding seat racing that I might have missed.