Author: readyallrow

Uncategorized

It’s been awhile.

By

And all it took was a global pandemic to lure me back.

OK, that’s not entirely true – it’s only part of why I’m here – but being 3.5 weeks into this new quarantined reality with quite literally nothing else to do seemed like as good of a time as any to log back in and reconnect with everyone.

If I had a dollar for every time someone asked, emailed, or DM’ed “what happened to the blog” over the past two years, I probably could’ve paid my very expensive New York City rent for at least two or three months. The long answer is … well, long … but the short answer is that I needed a break. Like everything else about this sport, writing this blog requires a lot of inspiration and passion and frankly, I just didn’t have it anymore. I’d been running on fumes for about 6 months before I stopped writing anyways and once the fumes ran out I just lacked the motivation to figure out how to refill the tank. I obviously can’t extricate myself from rowing completely but abandoning the blog was (at the time) the simplest solution to a more complex problem.

Fast forward to April 2020 and all of our seasons are cancelled, our daily schedules are dictated by our new Zoom overlords, and you’re probably super pissed that right as you were about to get back on the water, you got sucked back into that winter training feeling of “what should I even be doing right now to get better”.

Which brings me to … Ready all, row. I think there’s a lot of ways to come out the other side of this as a better coxswain and if I can help you do that, I want to! I’ve got my own ideas for how we can navigate this weird period of time together but I’d love to hear from you – what do you need right now and how can I help?

Shoot me an email or DM me on Instagram and let’s talk!

In the early months of training you're thinking 'What the hell is all this for?' because the race is so far off. There's so much tedium and discipline and brutal effort to hammer through. You have to resist the subconscious desire to put an end to all this self-inflicted hardship. But as the days pass and you feel yourself getting stronger, you begin to live for the next day. You punish yourself if with a will in training, because you know you're facing a race that will suspend your life. Somewhere in the race, you will find out what it is you've been working for. And your asking big questions of your body, and when the right answers are coming back, it's a feeling you know you will never forget.

Dan Topolski Oxford University
How to increase the effectiveness of your coxswain evaluations

Coxing Teammates & Coaches

How to increase the effectiveness of your coxswain evaluations

By

Evals have been a frequent topic of discussion this week between the heavyweight and lightweight coaches and I. One of the conversations I had was about the things I think make evals effective – beyond, you know, actually doing them and going over them with your coxswains instead of just shoving 30 pieces of paper their way and expecting them to decipher everything on their own.

Related: Coxswain evaluations + how I organize them

Consistency

You have to do them on a regular basis throughout the year – once a year whenever you or your coach remembers isn’t good enough. One of the biggest ways we created buy-in from the MIT guys was by doing them consistently at the same time every year ..  in the fall during the week between HOCR and the Princeton Chase, mid-week during the winter training trip in Cocoa Beach, and again mid-week during spring break. It got to the point where they’d start asking me if “we’re gonna do evals this week” because they knew they were coming up.

Having them on your calendar and doing them at key points throughout the season means that your performance from training camp, that big race, etc. will be fresh in everyone’s mind, which in turn leads to them being able to elaborate more on the feedback they’re giving you.

Support from the coaches

No, coaches, this doesn’t mean saying “yea evals are a good idea, go ahead and put something together and hand them out”. Another one of the big ways that helped create buy-in at MIT was how wholeheartedly supportive the coaches were and they showed that by introducing the evals to the team (specifically the freshman) each fall and explaining why we think they’re an important tool in coaching the coxswains that by providing the coxswains – their teammates – with feedback that will aid in their development throughout the year, they’re helping make the team faster.

Related: Coxswain evaluations 2.0

I made this point to the lightweight coaches earlier before we distributed evals for the Oakland trip – it’s one thing for me to say it but at this point, they don’t know me as well as they know the coaches they’re with every single day so hearing them say how much they value doing evals carries a bit more weight than it does if I say it. (Also I’m obviously biased about how important they are so there’s that too.)

A very important caveat

This one needs absolutely no elaboration – if you don’t fill out the evals, you leave excessively vague comments, or you don’t provide any comments/feedback at all, you forfeit your right to complain about or make requests/demands of the coxswains going forward.

Image via // @mattaiomara

Video of the Week

Video of the Week: Keith Jackson’s historic broadcast from the USSR to Seattle

By

Did you know that Keith Jackson – who spent 54 years as one of college football’s most famous announcers – considered this race between the University of Washington and the USSR to be the most exciting event he ever covered? Lots of history in this race but also pretty cool to see someone so well known in broadcasting be linked to it in such a unique way.

Coxing High School Q&A

Question of the Day

By

I’m 5’6″ and weigh from the low 120’s up to around 128 depending on the time of day, week, how much I’ve been eating and all of those lovely things. I am a Sophomore in high school and I haven’t grown much at all in the past 1 1/2 years. My mom stopped growing at my age too, so I suspect I am about done. However, I’m very self conscious about my weight. I have gotten several condescending comments from people who I don’t even know that consist of a long look at me and the response of “YOU’RE a coxswain? You’re tall!”. I don’t take offense to this because I go on to explain the importance of weight, and people understand.

However, about 3 weeks ago we had a weigh in before winter season workouts kicked off. My most stern/harsh coach who isn’t mean just… a little hardcore was there for my weigh in. I was wearing: leggings, long sleeve shirt, big sweatpants, sweatshirt and holding my phone when he told me to step on the scale. Of course I weighed in around 128 lbs. He looked at the scale, at me and then said “…did you know that?” He kind of laughed, wrote it down, and then looked at me again. I didn’t really know how to respond and I hate making excuses but I felt like I needed to explain how I hadn’t eaten very healthily that day. To be fair I hadn’t, but one day isn’t a huge deal every once and a while, also I didn’t know there was a weigh in. He didn’t seem impressed.

Ever since I feel like I really need to lose weight. I know I don’t NEED to for high school clubs, but I want too. It doesn’t help that there is a coxswain on our team who is not very good or motivational and is about 145 lbs. I hear complaints about her a lot and there is a coxswain who is a close friend who is around 104lbs who likes to brag about her weight. I’m excited to improve in my skills but not if I am not wanted as a 125lb cox where you do not get assigned a specific gender for your everyday coxing and racing. I may cox lightweight girls and heavyweight men on the same race day, so no weight is encouraged or specified for me. However, I’m not unrealistic with my goals (I don’t want to weigh 115 at 5’6″ with my body type). I was curious about college though? What would be their thoughts on a coxswain who was on the taller and heavier side? I’m 100% okay with coxing men! Thank you so much! 

OK well first of all, never weigh in in anything you wouldn’t race in. A uni or leggings and a tshirt should be the only things you ever wear when you step on the scale. Not to be a dick but that should be common sense.

I get what you’re saying about it being hard to pinpoint a good racing weight when you’re coxing every type of crew imaginable – that’s valid and a point worth bringing up to your coach. Nobody cares how tall you are (in college or high school) as long as you’re at or within a few pounds of racing weight so don’t worry about that. You’re like, the perfect size to cox men (where the racing weight is 125lbs in college) so maybe propose that to your coach and ask if you can start primarily going out with them. Pretty sure our varsity coxswain my first year at MIT and the men’s lightweight varsity coxswain my last two years there were 5’6″ – 5-8″ish so you wouldn’t stand out as “tall” at all if you coxed men. Plus, it’s one thing to cox a variety of crews to get the experience but even a half-decent coach has to see the failure in logic of putting a 120+ish pound coxswain in a lightweight women’s boat.

Don’t make this about the other coxswains either. There are shitty coxswains that weigh 108lbs and great coxswains that weigh 132lbs. Obviously coxswains that are over racing weight and aren’t that skilled are a frustrating bunch (for rowers and the other coxswains) but literally nothing good comes from pointing out their weight and skill level in the same sentence. I would however say something to your friend who likes to brag about her weight – congrats on being 104lbs but maybe chill with pointing it out every chance you get. A girl I used to cox with did this and it was so unnecessary, not to mention discouraging to one of the other coxswains who weighed like, 112lbs and felt like this girl was using her “109lbs” comments to rub it in her face that that’s why she was in the 3V instead of the 2V (even though it had nothing to do with that). If you’re cool with people knowing how much you weigh that’s fine but straight up bragging about it crosses a line (at least in my opinion) because you never know how someone will interpret it and the effects it could have on them. I really don’t think it’s too much to ask for people to be conscious of that.

Coxing High School Novice Q&A

Question of the Day

By

I saw one of your other posts and I thought that maybe you could help me as well. I’m 4’11 and in 7th grade. I really want to start rowing so my parents are finally letting me in the spring. I have researched all the positions and a lot of other crew related things and everything is a jumble. Is there anything that you think I should know about my appearance (clothes) or practice? Most importantly am I too big to be a coxswain? I have tried looking up the requirements for a coxswain but there is only answers for high school coxing.

You are definitely not too big to be a coxswain – I’m 4’11” too and have never been too big for anything in my life. The only requirements (to start with) are being the right size to fit in the seat and be close to racing weight, which for junior coxswains is 110lbs. (Since you’re only in middle school I wouldn’t worry too much about that right now though.) Whatever you read about high school coxswains applies to you though too – you all fall under the same “junior” umbrella.

Related: The Five Mandates of Coxing

When you’ve got some time to kill, check out the “defining the role of the coxswain” tag too. There’s tons of stuff in there that should help you get up to speed on what’s expected of you in just about every imaginable facet. Don’t get too overwhelmed though, you’re only in 7th grade so it’s unlikely that everything in there will be applicable to you but it is all good info to keep in the back of your head. As far as what to know about practice, check out that post linked above on the five mandates of coxing since you’ll want to be doing each of those things every day once you’re on the water.

Related: What are some items and pieces of clothing that you think all coxes should have at indoor practices (normal ones and tanks) as well as in the boat once we are on the water again? I’m trying out for a new team (switching from rowing to coxing) and I want to be prepared and give a good impression of that to the coach.

When it comes to what you should wear, there’s a whole tag dedicated to that too (check it out here). I’d stick with stuff from this post, this post, this post, and this post most days depending on whether you’re on land or on the water and what the weather’s like. This is what I wore when I raced at HOCR this year but it also tends to be my go-to outfit most of the spring and fall as long as the temperatures aren’t abnormally warm or cold.

Erg Playlists

Music to erg to, pt. 162

By

15 years ago yesterday I went to my first rowing practice with my high school team. To quote Drake, “started from the bottom now we here”.

Yesterday I posted the speech given by the alum we honored at our annual banquet last month – if you haven’t read it yet, definitely check it out. Lots of pearls of wisdom in there. I also posted a couple new recordings last week as well. If you’re a high school coxswain, I recommend listening to the first one (and reading the post linked below it) if you anticipate racing any time trials this year.

I’m flying to Oakland tonight for winter training with the lightweights (shout out if you followed the JFK shitshow on Instagram yesterday) and we’re rowing out of the Strokes boathouse so I might see some of you over the next week – definitely say hi if you see me around! I also think I’m doing a very chill and super informal clinic/Q&A that’s tentatively scheduled for Wednesday evening so if any of you are interested in coming to that, hit me up and I’ll share the details.