So … why in an eight is 3 seat considered the “worst rower?” Technically they’re still in middle 4 and I just don’t get it. Thanks!

I touched on this in a similar question about 5-seat – it’s linked below. The middle four has ONE job – row hard. They’re usually the bigger rowers of the crew so their only responsibility by being put in the middle is to generate power. That’s not a bad thing. Three seat just happens to be the seat where you have the least amount of impact on the balance of the boat (due to the boat being more stable in the middle since it’s wider), so theoretically you could put your weakest technical rower there and it would have as much of a negative effect on the boat as if they were in one of the other seats.

Related: So what’s the deal with five seat? I’ve heard a lot of jokes where people say five seat is the strongest but one time I was rowing five and another girl on my team goes “hey isn’t five seat the fat person?” Is that true or is it just kinda the same thing as “threetard’?

I think the only reason people think three seat is the worst rower is because they read those boat personality things and take them way too seriously. And by people, I mean novices (sorry guys) who sign up for crew, do some Googling to find out more about the sport, and then get it in their head that that’s the worst seat in the boat and they must suck as a rower if/when their coach puts them there.

Related: Hey, as a coach you might be able to tell me, in a quad how do you decide who goes where? And the same for an eight? Where you’re placed in the boat, should this tell you anything about where you “sit” compared to the rest of the crew?

Assuming your coach actually put some thought into the lineups, each person was probably placed in their specific seat for a reason. Unless you coincidentally display the same kind of personality traits as the ones listed in those boat personality things, they don’t actually mean anything.

Tags: boat personalities lineups qotd