An aggregate resource for all those riding in the 9th seat
Rowing Training & Nutrition Video of the Week
“You can’t out-fit efficiency.” We’re starting to get into the thick of racing season and those inches matter now and they’re gonna matter even more over the next few weeks as we enter the championship regattas.
When you’re steering around a turn and have to be (hard) on the rudder for two, three, four, five strokes, what does that do to the set of the boat (i.e. which direction does it fall) and how do you have the rowers compensate for it?
I’ve had to remind our coxswains about how this works a few times this year, in addition to getting questions about it via email, so I wanted to lay it out here to clear up any confusion.
You basically need to remember two very simple things: The boat is going to fall to the side that you’re steering towards and to compensate the rowers on that side need to lift their hands. This means that…
If you’re steering towards port the boat is going to fall to port. To compensate, the port rowers need to lift their hands for the duration of the time that you are on the rudder.
If you’re steering towards starboard the boat is going to fall to starboard. To compensate, the starboard rowers need to lift their hands for the duration of the time that you are on the rudder.
Once you’ve got your point and are off the rudder then you need to call the crew back to even handle heights. Don’t forget to do this or assume that the rowers will know when you’re off the rudder and do it themselves – they won’t.
The way I usually call it going into the turn is “on the rudder to port so ports let’s lift the hands for three strokes…” and then when I’m out of the turn I’ll say “OK, off the rudder, back to even hands on this next finish…”. I always specify how many strokes I plan to be on the rudder and I always specify when I want them to go back to even handle heights, that way everyone does it at the same time and at the same point in the stroke cycle.
College Rowing Video of the Week
Princeton posted this video early last month and if you’re into the idea of incorporating tech into your training, you’ll probably find this interesting. We’ve been using our Peach system for about a month now and it’s pretty cool. The guys are really into seeing their force curves after each practice and I’m convinced that the emails that get sent out with each guys’ watts from that practice are a subtle/clever tactic to get them to be even more competitive with each other. Lots of data to pour over but like Greg Hughes said in the video, it gives you a lot of opportunities to see where you can improve.
The 2016 camps spreadsheet is up – click here to check it out.
Similar to last year, you can see all the camps on the first tab, arranged by what area of the country they’re located in. Highlighted camps in each section indicate that they’re aimed at college rowers and coxswains (everything else is for juniors). I’ll try to keep this updated throughout the spring but if you know of any camps that I haven’t included that have their 2016 info up, feel free to send me an email.
Hi, I’m currently an sophomore high school girls coxswain and this question doesn’t really have to do with coxing or rowing, but I hope you can help me out. Both the junior and senior classes of my crew are very small, two people each. However, the sophomore class is quite big, around 15. Now that the spring season is starting only about 5 novices have joined so our coach, who was a rower back when the varsity team had 90 girls total, is mad at us and constantly pressing us to go out and recruit. Our school has about 600 people per grade so it shouldn’t seem too hard but I am not very good at talking to new people so I have a hard time going up to people to recruit. I am wondering if you have any tips on how to recruit and things to say to the person to get them interested in the sport.
Check out the post linked below. It’s mainly geared towards recruiting coxswains to your team (and what not to do) but there’s some stuff in there that’s applicable to recruiting in general.
Related: How to recruit coxswains
Instead of talking to individual people (which will never not be awkward) try reaching out to groups instead, like National Honor Society (pretty sure 3/4 of my team was in NHS), Model UN, Key Club, Student Council, etc. If your school has a marching band (particularly a competitive one), that’d be another good group to talk to. I think during my freshman and sophomore year at least half of us (which was like, 50ish people) were on the crew team too since it was a good way to stay in shape between when we finished in November and started again in July.
That’s obviously not a comprehensive list but it’s a good starting point if you think about the type of people that rowing typically attracts – driven, competitive, dedicated, etc. See if you can make a quick 5 minute pitch at the start of their next meeting and say that the team is looking for people who’d be interested in joining, this is when/where practice is, follow us on social media to get an idea for what the team is like, and if you have any questions talk to [the team captain(s), the seniors, or whoever else you designate]. You don’t have to give a ton of details right off the bat so just give them the pertinent information and then you can answer the more specific questions later. Another thing is to see if you can occupy a small part of the chalkboard in some of the classrooms. We did this my senior year and asked our AP/Honors teachers if they’d mind us writing something and leaving it there for a week or so and they were all pretty cool with it. I don’t remember what we wrote but it was probably something really simple (“WANNA ROW? 3PM. LIBRARY. SNACKS.”) written in a delightfully artsy design that only a bunch of 17 year old girls given colored chalk and free reign over the chalkboard could design.
Another great way to get new people is to talk to fall/winter athletes who aren’t doing a spring sport. We had a lot of swimmers, basketball players, volleyball players, cross-country runners, and soccer players on our team, in addition to several football players – wide receivers, running backs, safeties, and kickers specifically. These were always some of the best people on the team (physically and mentally) because they already had that competitive mindset that can be really hard to teach new athletes. If you’re trying to get walk-ons in the fall you can also have your coach talk to the coaches of the other fall teams and see if they can get a list of the kids that were cut that might have the potential (aka athletic ability) to excel at another sport. Just because they didn’t make the soccer team doesn’t mean they wouldn’t make a good rower!
Previously: Rush(ing) || Body angle || Pick drill || Suspension || Skying the blade || Quarter feather || Pin || Run || Lunge || Washing Out || Missing water || Footboard || Check || Ratio || Over compression || Release || Cut the cake || Hanging the blade || Shooting the slide
Pause drills happen on the recovery at any of the following points: the release, mid-thigh, hands away, bodies over, quarter-slide, toes, half-slide, or three-quarter slide.
Pause drills are a way to slow everything down, organize the bodies, and establish your positioning as you come out of bow. They’re an active process (similar to shooting drills in basketball) that tap into the need to be prepared. Each pause also acts as a “collection” or “gathering” point for the rowers to check themselves and ensure they’re in the same position as the other seven people so that the rest of the recovery leading into the catch is executed smoothly and in unison.
There are few times when a coxswain (particularly novices) sounds more robotic/”IDGAF” than when their crew is doing pause drills. The overwhelming majority rely on (and say) only one word for the entire duration of the drill – “go”. Not only does this get really old, really fast, it just makes you sound bored and disengaged. And trust me, I get that pause drills (like most drills) are boring but just because they are doesn’t mean you can be. There’s not a lot of “pause drill-specific” calls that you’ll make outside of general technical reminders (which by this point you shouldn’t have trouble coming up with on your own) but one thing you can do is stop saying “go” and replace it (or at the very least, alternate it) with stronger words that tie into what you want the rowers to do.
For example, if you’re doing a double pause drill at hands away and bodies over, instead of saying “go … go” after each pause, replace both of those with “pivot … row”. Instead of the rowers reacting to a word and doing whatever they want (not literally, more in the sense that whatever they do isn’t likely to be done together), they’re responding to a direct command (“pivot”) and focusing on swinging together into the next pause. Similarly, when I think of the word “row” I think of everyone moving together in time whereas “go” doesn’t really have that same feeling to it.
This isn’t specifically about calls but it’s also important to remember to make the pause long enough that the coach can jump in if they need to address something. We specify to our coxswains whenever we do these to “add in a two second pause at [wherever]” (it’s always two seconds) and that gives them enough time to actually pause and us enough time to jump in if/when necessary. There’s no sense in doing pause drills if your pause is 0.3 seconds long so count it out in your head (“one one thousand, two one thousand, row…“) and make sure the timing of each one is consistent.
What you’re looking for with pause drills is going to relate less to the “pause” and more to whatever thing the pause is actually addressing – i.e. if you’re pausing at the toes, square timing and body prep will be two things to keep an eye on. You should discuss with your coach (if it’s not mentioned at the start of practice) what the goal is for the drill, what the rowers should focus on, if there’s anyone in particular that we’re doing the drill for (i.e. 3-seat has been having issues with getting his shoulders forward before the slide starts so you’re doing bodies over pauses to help him work on that), and what you should be looking for as you go through it.
Outside of that, try to stay aware of how the slides feel after the pause(s). There shouldn’t be any rush to get to the next catch (especially if slide control is something you’re trying to address) so remind them that once they break the knees, let the boat come to them and keep the weight off the foot stretchers until the blade is locked in the water.
Pause drills are effective because, like I said earlier, they slow everything down and when done/called right, get everyone to breathe, relax, and focus on taking quality strokes instead of just moving back and forth on the slide.
Coxswain recordings pt. 9 – Dartmouth Heavyweights Pause Drill
Coxing How To Rowing Training & Nutrition
Previously: Steering, pt. 1 || Steering, pt. 2 || Boat feel || How to handle a negative coxswain eval || How to cox steady state workouts
Last week I talked about the nuances of coxing steady state workouts … this week is about coxing higher intensity, sprint workouts.
Related: How to cox steady state workouts
Whereas steady state workouts are all about the long, slow burn of energy, sprint workouts are all about the short and fast use of it. These workouts are anaerobic, meaning they don’t rely on oxygen like aerobic (steady state) ones do to produce energy. It’s created at a much higher rate but the caveat is that whatever pace you’re holding is only sustainable for a few seconds up to around two minutes. Think of it like this – if the body of a 2k is like the 800m or 1500m events in track (where you have to balance your power and endurance without relying to heavily on one or the other), the start and sprint are like the 100m dash (where you’re just going flat out as hard as you can for a very short period of time).
Power. Power, power, power. It’s a lot harder to make big technical changes during these pieces so you can’t be making the same kind of long, drawn out “coaching” calls that you make during steady state. This is your opportunity to really cox the rowers and get into it so don’t waste strokes by focusing too much on technique and not enough on getting them used to being in high pressure, racing-type situations (regardless of whether you’re next to another crew or not).
Since these shorter pieces usually involve being at or near race-pace, your tone should reflect that. Overall it should be alert, direct, and energetic without crossing the threshold of being batshit crazy and frantic (which is a typical novice problem). Your words should still be easily discernible … if they’re not, you need to slow down and focus on the quality of your calls and not the quantity.
Because the focus is more on power and you don’t have as much time to “coach” the rowers like you do when you’re doing steady state, the best/easiest way to incorporate technical calls into the workout is to tie them into your motivational ones. This is easy to do when you’re doing side-by-side pieces with another crew because you can make calls like “let’s take five to sharpen up the catches and take a seat on the JV” or even simpler, us any variation of “legs send“, “hook send“, “legs accelerate”, “direct squeeze“, etc. followed up with “WALKING” to let them know that whatever they’re doing is resulting in you walking on the other crew.
There’s usually not a ton of rest time (i.e. if you’re doing a 20 on, 10 off stroke rate ladder you’ve got maybe 30 seconds between each 20) so you have to make the most of the off-time by quickly and succinctly touching on the positive/negatives of the piece and reiterating whatever the focus/goals are for the next one. When I’m coxing this usually sounds like “OK guys, first 10 felt good but the second 10 started to sag, let’s make sure we’re staying light on the seats and picking it up together with the hips and not with the shoulders…”. I usually try to get out whatever I want/need to say in the first three or four strokes, that way they can row a few strokes in silence before we build it up again.
If you’ve got a little longer between pieces, like if you’re doing 4x2k and have two(ish) minutes between each one, then that gives you a bit more time to discuss with your stroke seat how it felt and decide what the focus needs to be for the next piece. Keep in mind that you’ve gotta balance that with (in most cases) stopping, spinning, communicating with the other coxswain(s) on your point, getting lined up, and giving the coach(es) time to talk if there’s anything they want/need to say. Even though there’s technically more rest time you might not actually get more time to converse with the crew so keep your feedback short like how I mentioned during the first example and then elaborate as necessary if you have time.
You must – must – paddle after these pieces for at least ten strokes so the lactic acid (the byproduct of energy production) can work its way out of the rowers’ bodies. Stopping abruptly after a high intensity piece and not giving the body a chance to remove it can eventually lead to muscle cramps so remind the crew to keep moving and take slow, consistent breaths (since the burning feeling in their bodies is due to both lactic acid build up and a lack of oxygen – remember, anaerobic = no oxygen).
Coxing How To Rowing Training & Nutrition
Previously: Steering, pt. 1 || Steering, pt. 2 || Boat feel || How to handle a negative coxswain eval
As disappointed as I am that we got like, no snow this winter, I am pumped that we were able to get on the water a full five weeks sooner than we were last year. We’ve been out for about two weeks now and have been doing our usual mix of steady state workouts and shorter, higher intensity pieces. I know there are several guys that love doing sprint workouts and loathe the steady state ones so on days when we’re doing 3-2-1 @ 18-20-24 for 19 minutes (like we did yesterday with the 1V) it’s important that the coxswains do their part to keep the energy up in the boat. This is accomplished less by knowing what to say (though that helps, obviously) and more so understanding how to cox these types of pieces, which is what today’s post is going to be about.
Steady state (aerobic) workouts are long pieces at low(er) rates with short amounts of rest between each individual piece. In rowing, the longer you can go before the body experiences fatigue the better, so in order to accomplish that we focus the bulk of our training on workouts that work to improve our cardiovascular fitness. Simply put, the stronger the cardiovascular system, the better your endurance, and the further into a 2k you’ll get before you start to get tired. If you can delay the onset of fatigue from, for example, 1300m to 1800m, that could be the difference in who crosses the line first.
These pieces are prime opportunity to focus on technique and incorporate in the things you’ve heard the coach saying to the crew/individual rowers, as well as continue reiterating the concepts they’re trying to convey when you’re doing drills. For example, this week we’ve really been going all in on the catch. Since that’s the only part of the stroke we’ve really focused on, if I were our coxswains I’d make sure that was my main priority as far as technical calls go. You don’t want to be bouncing around (i.e. making a call for the catch on one stroke, a call for the finish on the next one, etc.) because that’s distracting so make a point to consider what your coach’s main focus has been that day/week so that your calls incorporate and reinforce that.
You can also tie in your technical focus to your team goals. For example, last year we lost to GW at Sprints by an absurd 0.1 seconds, which ended up preventing the eight from going to IRAs. If you consider how minuscule 0.1 seconds is when spread out across 2000 meters, it’s easy to see how all eight rowers consistently getting the blades in just a hair sooner at the catch and maximizing the amount of time they’re in the water can make a difference.
Tone is an area where a lot of coxswains struggle during steady state. If your tone is passive then the rowing will be too so you’ve got to work to find a balance between the energy you bring during sprint pieces and not sounding like Ben Stein in Ferris Bueller (YouTube it).
When it comes to what you’re saying during sprint pieces, you’ll want to be moving between two types of calls – normal coxing calls and “coaching” calls. Your normal coxing calls should be said in a crisp, focused tone that gets the rowers attention without being jarring or too in their face. (If these types of calls are at an 8-9ish during a race, during steady state they should be around a 6-7ish.) Coaching calls are said in a more conversational tone – you’re not necessarily trying to match the rhythm of the strokes or anything like that, you’re just talking to the crew like you’d talk to them during a normal face to face conversation.
As with all your calls, you should keep your coaching calls as tight as possible and eliminate any filler words but don’t get so hung up on the idea that a call is only right/good if it’s five monosyllabic words or less. That’s not how it works (but that’s a conversation/debate for another post).
During steady state the bulk of my calls tend to be coaching calls but I try to follow up with coxing calls as necessary to reiterate the main point of whatever I was just saying. (I wanna say I do this ~50% of the time.) Below are two examples of some coaching calls based on some of the notes I’ve taken this week and in the case of the first one, what coxing calls I’d follow them up with.
“Let’s get the blades locked in behind us here … making sure we’re accelerating through our full arc. Unweight the hands in the last second of the recovery, find that resistance, … and prrry through. Pick off the catch … and accelerate. Lock, squeeze … lock, squeeze … lock, squeeze.“
“The goal is to let gravity do the work so let’s sharpen up the catches by relaxing the outside shoulder and unweighting the handle before the slides turn around.”
Compared to your normal “lock, send” type of calls, these take a lot longer to say which some of you might try to get around by saying them as quickly as you can force them out of your mouth. Don’t. One, no one can understand you when you do that. Literally no one. Two, as you run out of breath you get quieter so by the time you finish your sentence your bow four probably assumes that you just trailed off because they can’t hear anything you’re saying. Three, in situations like this there’s nothing wrong with taking three, four, five strokes to say something to the crew. You’re rowing for 10+ miles, I think you can spare a few strokes to make a single call.
Another important thing to remember is that you don’t have to talk the entire time, nor should you. Not only is that the easiest way to run out of things to say and set yourself up to become a repetitive parrot, eventually the rowers are just going to tune you out because you’re annoying and not saying anything substantial. Not talking gives you a chance to focus on the bladework and mull over in your head what calls you want to make while also giving them some time to process what you/the coach have been saying (and/or just enjoy rowing in silence for a bit). I try to break up my calls by doing 30 second internal focuses if there’s something specific I want them to think about (“Let’s take the next 30 seconds to listen to the catches and tighten up the timing…”) or I’ll just … stop talking for a bit. I don’t think you not talking always needs to be planned or announced but try to keep an eye on the clock anyways so that you don’t go for more than a minute at time without saying something (unless otherwise instructed).
When you’re doing these pieces you want to be aware of any time restrictions that are placed on the piece or the amount of rest since they usually correlate to a specific heart rate zone that you’re trying to stay within. (For example, if you’ve got three minutes of rest between pieces, make sure that it’s actually three minutes and not ninety seconds or five minutes. This is also why you need a working cox box and/or a watch – your phone doesn’t count.) The time between pieces is usually going to be spent paddling, spinning, getting water, discussing the previous piece, or a combination of all four so you’ve got to monitor your timer and not let them sit for too long or waste too much time getting water or lined up because this can mess with how effective the piece is.
Related: (Another reason) Why you need a working cox box
Also keep in mind that when you’re doing steady state with another boat, you’re not racing or competing against them. You can go off of them as positive reinforcement (“yea guys, we took three seats over the last ten strokes just by focusing more on maximizing our length through the water…” or “we’re side by side with the 2V right now, let’s see if we can push our bow ball ahead by getting a little more connection off the front end”) but you shouldn’t be going out and saying “OK, they’re seven lengths of open ahead of us, let’s take ten to walk back a seat”. Like … no. I’ve listened to way too many recordings where coxswains do that.
If I’m doing a long row with another crew then I’ll spend 98% of it focused on us and then maybe get competitive with them if they’re nearby (while still staying within the confines of the piece as far as rate goes) for the last few hundred meters, just to tie everything together and make sure we end on a high note. It’s not the main, secondary, or even tertiary focus of these pieces though so don’t go out there when you’re doing 12 miles of steady state with the sole goal of “beating” the other boat.
Previously: Rush(ing) || Body angle || Pick drill || Suspension || Skying the blade || Quarter feather || Pin || Run || Lunge || Washing Out || Missing water || Footboard || Check || Ratio || Over compression || Release || Cut the cake
The catch.
The majority of the time when we talk about hang we’re talking about suspension but in this case “hang” means to pause at the catch and let your blade hang in the air before dropping it in the water. You want the blade to be moving down to the water as the wheels are rolling through the last few inches of the slide so that you’re changing direction just as the blade becomes fully buried. When you hang the blade, you basically just get to the front end and stop without the blade changing height relative to the water.
Related: Top 20 terms coxswains should know: Suspension
This is where you’ll make/hear a lot of “direct to the water” calls. You can/should also remind the rowers that they should be unweighting the hands (not lifting – unweighting) the hands in the top quarter of the recovery so that the moment when the blade enters the water and their slides stop coming forward is the same point in time. One shouldn’t happen before the other. When I’ve coached younger crews, explaining the catch as a motion rather than a position has helped them understand this better and eliminate the pause at the front end (which most of the time they don’t realize they’re doing).
Calls for slide control (coupled with “direct to the water”-esque calls) can also help here because you’ll sometimes see rowers rushing their slides and then hanging out at the catch waiting for everyone else to get there, which usually leads to them having choppy catches or being late.
Related: Top 20 terms coxswains should know: Rush(ing)
This is slightly less obvious from the coxswain’s seat than it is from the launch but what you’ll see is a very obvious (but quick) pause in the blade’s movement at the front end. It’s not something I’m always on the lookout for but if I notice a rower is missing water at the catch then I’ll watch to see if I can see them winding up (aka dropping the hands at the catch causing their blade to sky) and then stopping before putting the blade in.
Related: Top 20 terms coxswains should know: Skying the blade
Hanging the blade at the catch turns the stroke into a stop and go movement instead of one fluid motion which prevents the crew from establishing a consistent and easy-to-lock-onto rhythm. It also messes with the catch timing (duh – you’re always going to be late), your ability to have a long, complete stroke (since you’ll be missing water at the start of the drive as a result of not getting your blade in before the slide changes direction), and the shell’s ability to achieve its maximum run (because you’re missing water → not generating as much power → not getting as much send at the finish).
Related: Top 20 terms coxswains should know: Missing water
Like several of the other terms, this isn’t one I’ve talked about on the blog before so below are two videos that demonstrate the difference between hanging the blade (the first one) and going straight to the water (the second one).
Very start and stop-y and you can see the missed water as they start their drive.
Much more smooth and fluid.
College Coxing High School Racing Rowing Training & Nutrition
Given that it’s National Eating Disorder Awareness Week I thought this was an appropriate video to share. It’s from a talk on weight management that was given during the Sparks coxswain camp this past December. It’s only about nine minutes long so I encourage you to set aside some time to watch it (in addition to sharing it with the other coxswains on your team). There’s some great info, advice, and anecdotes in here but beyond that, at the very least I hope this serves as a wake-up call for those of you who are or are considering employing unsafe methods of losing weight.