Tag: coxing style

Question of the Day

By readyallrow December 12, 2017

I’ve been reading your blog for nearly a year now and I attribute pretty much all of my “success” to you. I have a few things to ask. Firstly, this is my first varsity year (I’m a freshman) but I was in the V4 in the fall due to all the coxswains except for one sophomore graduating last year. Reading this blog definitely let my coxing grow by leaps and bounds. Recently my coach has told me that he’d like for the coxswains to work on positive reinforcement and that being critical of the rowers was more his job. We should keep technical calls to a minimum and only “say things pertinent to boat speed”. I’m a person who uses a *lot* of tech calls. The thing is, we have another coxswain who uses very few tech calls and I know a significant portion of the rowers dislike the way she coxes, some more strongly than others. I have rowed in her boat before and agree with them a lot so I have tried to tailor my coxing to be as different from hers (almost) as possible. She often comes off as patronizing, so I was wondering how I might provide positive reinforcement without sounding patronizing or dumb, especially when some of my rowers really just want me to be critical all the time.

This is a good question. I think your coach makes a valid point in that being critical of the rowers – though I’m not 100% settled on if that’s the right or best word – is more in line with his role than it is ours. We’ve definitely got a part to play in that but it can be tough to know how much, especially if it’s never explicitly laid out.

I’m curious why your coach wants you to keep technical calls to a minimum since those make up like, the bulk our calls. That’s definitely something I would talk to him about and get clarification on so that there’s no confusion or ambiguity on your part about what he’s looking for. Alternatively though, it’s possible you might be hearing the extremes of what he’s saying and not what he’s actually trying to get you to do. My interpretation as a coxswain (and also how I’d try to communicate it as a coach) is that his job is to outright say “you’re doing this incorrectly” and then follow it up with how it should be done. Your job is to reinforce the latter part of that with positive reinforcement by making calls like “Let’s draw in level – elbows up – and hold the finishes here. Yea, that’s it, we’re pushing the puddles back an extra half a seat now…” (vs. “you’re washing out, we need to get more run”).

It’s not that you should keep the technical calls to a minimum necessarily, it’s that whatever ones you are making should a) largely be in line with whatever his technical focus is for the day and b) less about telling the rowers what not to do (which can come off as condescending, patronizing, etc.) and more on communicating what they should do and how it’s impacting the boat speed. There is a balance when it comes to your technical calls – if it’s all you make then you’re just gonna get drowned out because it’s a lot to process and not always that engaging – but you can’t really positively reinforce anything if you’re not making the initial calls to correct the issue in the first place.

Don’t overthink what qualifies as “positive reinforcement” either. A simple “yea, that’s it…”, “there it is…”, “Sam, good change from yesterday, catches are looking a lot smoother…” etc. is all you need. You’re only going to come off as dumb if you start sounding like a cheerleader or patronizing if you start saying everything with an air of “I don’t know what’s so hard about doing XYZ, I could do it…”. When it comes to actually taking a stroke, there’s literally no logical reason why any coxswain should feel superior about their ability to do it compared to a rower. I’m not saying we can’t all be good rowers in our own right – I know plenty of coxswains who are – but rowing’s not our thing. We’d get pissed (and most of us do) if rowers acted like that about steering or whatever other coxswain-specific thing so … just something to keep in mind.

Check out the post linked above – I think it touches on roughly the same stuff you’re asking here and goes into a lot of detail about positive calls vs. negative calls, which kinda parallels what you’re asking about how to balance positive reinforcement with calling out the rowers when it’s necessary.

College Coxing Q&A Teammates & Coaches

Question of the Day

By readyallrow October 3, 2017

I’ve been coxing for a little bit over a year now in my college crew, and we are currently working on prepping our guys for head race season. There are three coxswains, including me, but two boats so right now I’m fighting for my seat. I feel like all three of us have about the same collegiate coxing experience and have about the same capability of steering correctly for that race, so all that really differs are our styles. One of the cox’s is super happy and upbeat and really cheers the guys on to race better while the other one is really technically savvy and gets really aggressive whereas I’m pretty much smack dab in the middle of their styles. I have a feeling that my coach prefers them over me but I don’t want to change and be something I’m not. What should I do?

I get what you’re saying but I also think it’s important to point out that when you’re in the boat, even though you’re “in charge”, you’re still working for eight other people (nine, if you count your coach). If there’s something that’s preferred by the majority, you have to be the one to adapt, not them. I’m not a super peppy, cheery type of coxswain but I’ve coxed boats where that’s the style they’ve responded best to, so even though it’s not my style or personality at all, I had to incorporate some of that into my coxing because it’s what made the boat faster. I’ve also had coaches who pushed me to be a more technical, drill sergeant-y coxswain that I was prepared to be given that’d I’d only been coxing for a year or so. I wasn’t thrilled about adapting my style of coxing to be more of either of those things but I also had no right or reason to say “no, I’m not doing this”. Even now, I’ve been coxing for 15 years and I still adapt to whatever the crew wants (even when they say they’ll default to my style) because saying “I don’t want to change and be something I’m not” just fundamentally feels like I’m going against the most basic role of coxing, which is to serve the crew.

Anyways, to answer your question, you should talk with your coach. Say that you want to make sure you’re staying competitive for one of the two spots that are available and you wanted to see what observations they’d made about your coxing through the first few weeks of practice. If you’ve been working on stuff, like refining your steering or increasing your technical feedback during drill work, say that and ask if there are any other areas where they feel you could stand to make improvements that would give you a better shot at being placed in one of those two boats.

I don’t typically think you should bring up other coxswains in conversations like this but I do think a good question to ask every once in awhile is what they’re doing well that you could incorporate if it’s not something you’re doing already. At MIT our varsity coxswain the last two years was always great about keeping things running during practice, not wasting time, responding immediately when we’d ask him to do something, etc. and that was huge in ensuring we were using our time effectively. Our 2V coxswain was OK at this but still left a lot to be desired so this was something I talked about with her a lot, especially in the context of things she could do to make a case for being boated higher. Bottom line, if you get the feeling your coach prefers the other coxswains over you, talk to them and see if that’s the case … but approach it by asking what they’re doing to make things run better, faster, and smoother, not in a whine-y “why do you like them better than me” kind of way. (I’ve been in the room when college coxswains have done that and it just makes me roll my eyes so hard.)

I can’t remember what the context of this story was but a coach I worked with a few years ago said that one of the best things a new varsity coxswain asked him was “what did [the last varsity coxswain, let’s call him Jake] do that made your job easier?”. (He was similar to you, pretty much in between two other coxswains and was trying to figure out how he could get an edge over the other two in order to become the permanent 1V coxswain.) Obviously all the standard stuff applied but the primary thing was Jake’s coachability and adaptability, meaning that he took feedback, reflected on it, and found ways to immediately tweak his coxing based on what he was seeing/hearing from others. He also was able to get into any boat, be it the 1V eight or the 4V four and make it go fast, even when the boats varied wildly in the style of coxing they responded to. If you can get into a boat that likes cheerleaders and get them to respond and then get in a boat the next day with a crew who likes an in-your-face hardass and do the same thing (and steer straight on top of all of that), you’re basically worth your weight in gold.

Basically what you need to do is, one, like I said, talk to your coach and two, whenever you’re in the launch, observe the styles, presence, etc. of the other two coxswains to see what they’re doing well and then try to incorporate some of that into your own coxing the next time you go out. The absolute dumbest reason for losing your seat in a boat is “I didn’t want to change what I was doing”. You’ve only been coxing for a year so while I get that you’ve probably established a style of coxing, it’s definitely not going to be the one you stick with for your entire career so use this opportunity to identify the areas where you can ebb and flow a bit with your approach in order to give you the best shot at making one of the boats.

Coxing Q&A Racing

Question of the Day

By readyallrow August 18, 2016

I’m trying out for New Trier Novice Rowing in a couple days (go NT! I was super excited to see New Trier in the 8+ Midwest Championships recording!) and wanted to know what the real rules are on swearing in a race. I heard that you can get DQ’d but it is super rare and most coxswains swear anyway. What are your thoughts?

I’ve talked about swearing before whenever it comes up in the recordings posts but I kinda laid out how I feel about it in the recruiting post linked down below. Tl;dr, as long as you’re not doing it gratuitously or being over-the-top obnoxious about it … who cares. If you’re sending audio off to coaches you should definitely be mindful of how much swearing there is but if you have a really great recording that you think demonstrates your best abilities as a coxswain but you also say “fuck yea” in it a few times, just throw it in iMovie and bleep it out before you send it off. Should take 10 minutes tops and you’ve spared the adults from having to hear the dreaded “f-word” without sacrificing an opportunity to show what you can do.

You can get DQ’ed, it is pretty rare (in my years of experience, at least), and … I wouldn’t say most but a decent number of coxswains do swear anyways. If I had to guess maybe a little more than half of the recordings I’ve listened to in the last four years have included some amount of swearing. I haven’t run the analytics on them but just loosely thinking about the ones I’ve listened to (not just the ones I’ve posted on here), coxswains of men’s collegiate crews swear the most, followed by junior men’s coxswains, collegiate women, and junior women. I don’t think the gender of the coxswain has made much of a difference though, it tends to be more about the gender of the crew.

Anyways, I asked the refs on Twitter (solid account and super responsive if you ever have questions – highly recommend following them at @USRowingRefs) just to get their input and because I couldn’t remember what the official rule said so above is what they told me.

To the right is what Rule 2-410 from the rule book (page 29) says. The unsportsmanlike conduct thing is a given (and I’ve said that before on here plenty of times) but, like they said, ultimately they have to hear it and decide to act on it.

Usually during our home races I’ll drive the officials in the launch and last year I asked one of them about this (because a coxswain was swearing pretty loudly during the race but it was in the vein of the “fuck yea” example I gave earlier) and they said that they personally just use discretion when it comes to issuing penalties or DQ’ing someone. They likened it to when you get pulled over by a cop for speeding … if you’re 5-10mph over the limit but otherwise driving safely the officer will use his/her discretion and probably let you off with a warning. If you’re driving like you’re auditioning for Tokyo Drift though then they’re obviously gonna come down on you a lot harder. It’s the same with the swearing thing … you need to be mindful of the rules but keep in mind that some refs might not be as lenient as others.

This probably isn’t the clearest reply to your question so I’ll just repeat what I’ve said in the past: I’m not gonna say “don’t do it”, just be smart, use your judgment, and without hesitation, take full responsibility if there’s fallout from it.

Coxing Q&A

Question of the Day

By readyallrow July 12, 2016

Hi, I just wanted to know how you think the style of coxing differs between the US and the UK. I’ve been coxing in the UK for a couple of years and the calls made during races seem to be made in a more rhythmic and fluid style (if that makes sense, probably not), whereas in the videos I’ve watched of US crews there seems to be a lot of counting with stuff thrown in between each number, which I think is a bit cluttered. Of course this is only based on a couple of videos I’ve watched but I might be going to the US for university, so would I have to adapt my style to the one I’ve seen? Thanks.

This is a really good question. I don’t think you’d have to completely abandon whatever you’re used to but you will probably have to adapt a little bit. I wouldn’t say that’s uncommon though – my style changed a little when I went to college but I’d probably classify it more as evolving rather than adapting to an entirely new way of coxing. I mean, there was some adapting but not a ton. There were definitely things I had to do that were different than how I’d done it for the previous four years but a lot of what I did differently was a result of just realizing there were new (not better or worse, just new) ways of doing things that I hadn’t been exposed to before. If I were you that’s the attitude I’d have going into this if you do come here for college … I think it makes the idea of potentially doing things differently a lot less daunting.

To make a really bad comparison/analogy, think of it like learning to drive on the other side of the road. You’re still doing all the basic driving “things” the same, you’ve just gotta get used to being on a new side (of both the car and road). It’s the same with coxing. The core of it is all the same, it’s just the nuances of it that might be different than what you’re used to.

As far as US vs. UK style, there’s absolutely no way I can give an unbiased opinion or breakdown on this since the US style is what I’m most familiar with. To me personally (and sorry if this is offensive), the UK style is the equivalent of nails on a chalkboard. There is no style of coxing that I dislike more than that super rhythmic, roller coaster-y style of speaking. If I close my eyes and listen to a recording I actually feel like I’m on a roller coaster that is just continuously going up and down and up and down and up and down and up and down. It’s so distracting! I’ve asked friends to listen to the audio to see if maybe it’s just me but we all tend to feel the same way and agree that the biggest difference between the two styles comes down to our speech patterns and how we say things. For the most part I think we’re communicating the same things but the US style is more to give a constant stream of information so that the rowers know exactly what’s going on at any given point in the race whereas the UK style tends to have periods of silence before interjecting occasional updates about whatever they’re seeing/feeling or their position relative to whatever else is going on. I wouldn’t say the UK style is fluid at all, if anything it’s as terse as you can possibly get … but that’s obviously based on the handful of UK recordings I’ve listened to and my preconceived notions about that style based off of what I’ve heard, know, and like (or dislike, rather).

Now that you’ve posed the question this is definitely something I want to explore more. I’m curious to know how much, if at all, international coxswains have adapted their style when they come to the US for college. If anyone knows a coxswain here in the US who “grew up” coxing a different way, have them email me. Feel free to comment too and let me know what you think.

Coxing How To Q&A Teammates & Coaches

Question of the Day

By readyallrow June 23, 2016

Hey! I have a couple questions.

1. I’m not very good at taking criticism. Mentally I don’t mind it and I try to use it and everything, but for some reason emotionally I seem to take it as an attack and always feel close to crying. I’m not sure why this is and I was wondering if you have any tips.

2. We just got a new coach and he’s doing a summer rowing program, which is great, but he’s trying to completely change my style of coxing. I understand that repetitiveness is something I need to work on, but he’s telling me that while I was coxing the rowers on the ergs that I was “singing” to them. He expects me to be much louder (which I can be when I choose to be- I prefer to save it and use it as a “wake up” call kinda thing to change the pace of the race) and also be more direct and short (which I understand that part of and agree with). How should I deal with this? Should I try to explain my ways (I did a bit) or just go with what he says? And how do you work on being less repetitive ?

Thanks!! (Sorry if the second one is kind of a loaded question. Today was the first day with the new coach and tomorrow is the first day on the water)

So this is always a question that I genuinely don’t know how to answer and always struggle with when people ask for advice on how to work through it. I think my initial thoughts on it tend to come off kind of flippant (unintentionally) which makes it hard to give legit feedback without sounding like an ass. My take on it though is that if you can acknowledge the value in what’s being said and are able to use it … I don’t see how at the same time it can be construed as an attack. You’ve gotta be able to separate you the coxswain from you the person, which I talked about in the post linked below. If someone says “you’re a bitch” then yea, that’s clearly a personal attack but if they say “you need to work on your steering”, that has absolutely nothing to do with you as a person. One of the things I learned early on in coxing is that you have to – have to – look at everything objectively. As soon as you start letting emotions cloud your judgement or how you interpret situations you’re shooting yourself in the foot and limiting your growth potential.

Anyways, moving on. It kinda seems like you’re contradicting yourself a bit here by saying your coach wants to completely change how you cox … but you acknowledge that you could do XYZ better. Normally in situations where a coach is at odds with a coxswain’s style I’d advocate for them to, at the very least, explain their approach so the coach can better understand why they do things a certain way. In most cases I think that as long as your approach isn’t completely ass-backwards to the way things should be done (which some coxswains try to pass off as “their style”) and you’re able to clearly communicate how/why coxing this way works for your crew, most coaches will take a step back and let you do your thing. I’ve had to do that before (not even with new coaches either, with my coaches that I’d worked with for 3-4 years) and one of my coaches who was a coxswain said that even though he didn’t necessarily agree with how I was doing it, I presented it in a way that at least made sense and he could see that the crew responded well to it.

Related: Words

In your case though, I think you should just go with what he says for the time being (give it a trial period of a week or two) and see how it goes. Tell him that you’re going to be working on XYZ and ask if he can give you some feedback over the next few days about how you’re doing. After your trial period is up, compare and contrast the changes you made with how you were coxing before. What improved, what stayed the same, etc. Whatever improves, based on his and the rowers feedback, incorporate it and do it from now on. With whatever stays the same, explain that you tried doing [whatever] the way he suggested and the rowers didn’t really respond to it or felt kinda “meh” about it so you’re probably just gonna stick with how you were doing it before, at least for now.

With whatever suggestions you don’t use or incorporate, I’d at least keep them in your back pocket to use if/when you need to try something new. There have definitely been times where a coach has suggested something to me and I’m just like “lol no” because I know it won’t work or sounds ridiculous but other times, even if their suggestion doesn’t work at the time with whatever boat I’m coxing, I’ll try to remember it so if a time comes when I’m feeling burnt out or the crew I’m with is hitting a mental plateau, I’ve got something on hand that I can try. Why create extra work/stress for myself by trying to come up with new calls/strategies when I can just re-try or re-purpose ones that have already been suggested to me?

As far as how to work on being less repetitive, check out the post linked above. A good place to start would be to listen to your recordings and identify which calls you use most frequently, that way you can then think about what you’re actually trying to say and come up with more specific calls from there. If you’re one of those coxswains that says “let’s go” or “now” every 5 strokes during a race then working on creating a basic race plan would probably go a long way in helping cut down on the repetitiveness. The less room you give yourself to make seemingly random calls like that (outside of where they can/should be used), the better you’ll be at communicating effectively with the boat.

College Coxing How To Novice Q&A

Question of the Day

By readyallrow April 2, 2015

Got 2 very different questions:

1) How would you describe the difference between a good men’s coxswain and a good women’s coxswain?
2) I’m going to be head of coxswains this fall – we call the position the Cox-Coach – so I’ll be in charge of cox education, both for novices and varsity. I’m already asking for input from our current coxswains and rowers, but here’s my question for you: ideally, what would week one look like in the training of a novice college coxswain (before ever going out on the water), and what are specific ways to help continue coxswain education long term?

Thanks!!

I’ll use our coxswains as an example for your first question because we just went over their evals from spring break today and it’s fresh on my mind. We have two women and one guy that make up our team of coxswains – the guy is a senior, one of the women is a junior, and the other is a freshman. All three of them are very good but what separates the guy from the girls (and why our team tends to favor him for racing) is his style of motivation. When we’re doing hard pieces he’s very loud, aggressive, raw, and in your face (you’ll see this when I post the videos I took last week). One of the rowers commented on his eval that he’s very good at getting them focused on pulling hard and winning but on the flip side he tends to only focus on rowing hard instead of first getting the individuals and crew as a whole rowing well. Basically his forte is that testosterone-backed style of motivation that just comes a lot more naturally to men than it does to women.

Alternatively, both the women bring a very calm energy to the boat. They can get aggressive when they want/need to but it’s a more calm motivational style that you typically associate with women. The energy they bring to the boat as described by the rowers is a more practical energy that they use to get the crew rowing well and swinging together. Having primarily coxed women in school this is definitely how I’d describe several of my friends. Personality-wise they tended to be a little more quiet and reserved off the water than others of us and that was reflected in their coxing style on the water. One thing I think we (and most women’s coxswains I know) were all really, really good at though was getting inside our rowers heads in that sick way that only women can do to each other. (I know some of you will know exactly what I mean by that too.) In my experience both with the men’s crews I’ve coxed and with coaching these guys, they all definitely prefer the more raw, in your face style whereas women’s crews don’t respond nearly as well compared to the calmer, more tactical approach.

So, I guess to answer your question … even though the answer is completely subjective based on each individual crew … what I think it comes down to is their style of motivation. Women’s coxswain also have to be a little bit better at how they phrase things and their approach to motivating certain personalities since in general women are a little more sensitive on that front compared to guys. The guys on our team probably wouldn’t blink an eye if our coxswains told them to stop being little bitches but if you said that to a women’s crew it probably wouldn’t go over as seamlessly. If anybody has any thoughts on this definitely feel free to share down in the comments.

For your second question, I think the first week should be spent just getting them familiar with the program and how things are run. Off the top of my head that’d most likely entail giving them a complete tour of the boathouse so they know where they can find things, where things are stored, which boats/oars are used by which crews, what the procedures are for various things (for example, how to notify someone that something isn’t working or needs fixed – we have a system for this at our boathouse where the rowers/coxswains/coaches fill out a slip that details whatever the issue is and then we attach it to a clipboard outside the workshop), etc.

Also introduce them to any relevant people, such as other coaches (it’s so awkward not knowing the other coaches and then having to awkwardly introduce yourself like, a week later…) and your boatman, if you’re lucky enough to have one. Boatmen can be a coxswain’s best friend (they always have spare wrenches which is great when the rowers lose yours … or in the case of our coxswains, drop them in the water three times in one week) so it’s worth it to get acquainted with them early on.

I’d also spend a day going over how your coaches run practice (what’s the standard “formula” look like – i.e. our practices start out with one or two drills that double as the warmup followed by pieces of some kind (the bulk of the workout) and ending with paddling/light steady state back to the docks) and what drills you typically do and how to call them (don’t get too into detail, just give them a brief “drills 101” overview). And then obviously you should also spend a day going over the different parts of the boat, how to work the cox box, how the steering system works, how to get the boats from the racks to the water (and back), and anything they should know about the water you row on (traffic pattern, shallow spots, areas to avoid, landmarks, etc.). The last two days of the week I would bring them out on the launch so they can observe practice themselves and see the thins you described about the waterway (traffic pattern, landmarks, etc.).

If you really want to go the extra mile, write all this down and give it to them in handout form so they can read it and not have to try to memorize everything you’re saying. Bonus points if you include labelled maps and diagrams since visualizing things tends to be a lot simpler and easier to understand than reading through dense paragraphs of notes.

As far as continuing coxswain education long term, making yourself available is definitely one of the most important things you can do. I don’t want to take too much credit for the improvements our coxswains have made this year but I think part of it goes back to them knowing that whenever they have questions or want to go over something I’m always available (and if I’m not, I’m always willing to make time outside of practice to talk). The more available you make yourself the more likely they are to ask questions or for feedback and in turn the better they’ll get. This might mean having regular “office hours” where you hang out at the boathouse for an hour each week and if someone has something they want to talk about, that’s their time to do it, or it might just be you putting out a general reminder, such as “I’m always free before/after practice, hit me up if you wanna talk”. Do what works for you.

Doing coxswain evaluations on a regular basis is also important because feedback from the rowers is critical in terms of know what’s working and what isn’t. Outside of that I don’t think there are any specific things you really need to do. I’ve done regularly scheduled meetings (usually on a weekly basis) in the past but it’s not always necessary so this year I’ve kind of adopted the whole “we’ll meet as a group if we need/want to and if we don’t, we won’t” mindset, which has worked fine for us. Like I said though, the biggest and best thing you can do is just making yourself available for when questions arise or they have something they want to discuss with you. It’s a really simple thing to do that can make a world of difference in the long run.

College Coxing High School Racing Rowing Teammates & Coaches

Interview with 2004 M8+ Gold Medalist Coxswain Pete Cipollone

By readyallrow September 18, 2014

Back in July I got an email from Jeremiah Brown, one of Canada’s silver medalists in the men’s eight from London asking if I’d be interested in reading and reviewing the book he’s been working on, “The Four Year Olympian“. It chronicles his journey from being a complete novice to making the Olympic podium in less than four years after picking up the sport. Yea … less than four years. Can you imagine doing that?

As I was reading through his book there were a couple sections that stuck out to me where he mentioned how when times were tense during training, he and the rowers would dish out a lot of abuse to their coxswain, Brian Price. Swearing at him, blaming him for things beyond his control, etc. – you guys all know what I mean because at some point or another in the last two years you’ve emailed me or messaged me on Tumblr trying to figure out how to handle those exact same situations.

This got me thinking … if elite level coxswains are dealing with this, maybe it would help you guys out to hear from them and read about how they handled being put in that position. So, I reached out to Pete to get his insight and see what advice he had to offer.

Here’s part of the email I sent to give you a bit more insight into why I wanted to do this:

“Hey! So I’m wondering if I could possibly persuade you to help me with a project I’m working on. Jeremiah Brown, from Canada’s ’12 M8+, wrote a book on how he made the Olympic 8+ and asked me to check it out before it got sent over to the publishers. While reading it, I had the idea to contact some national team coxswains that have been through the rigors of Olympic training and get their thoughts on how they handled taking the abuse of their rowers when tensions were high.

Jerry mentioned how they treated Brian like a “whipping boy” when things weren’t going so great, which actually surprised me because I didn’t think that that would be something you’d have to deal with at that level. I think I just assumed that by the time you reach that point in your career you’re mature enough or have developed good enough coping mechanisms to not have to take your frustrations out on other people.

It was encouraging though at the same time because I get a lot of similar questions from younger or newer coxswains that read my blog and want to know how to handle the rowers who feel like the only way to blow off steam is to blame them for every little thing that goes wrong. I think it would be helpful/reassuring for them to hear that it’s not something that’s exclusive to just high school rowing – coxswains at every level experience it and have to figure out how to work through it while maintaining positive working relationships with their teammates.”

Since there’s a tendency to hear the same regurgitated or long-winded replies that lack any substance (am I right or am I right…), I tried to put together questions that I haven’t seen be asked before so that the answers would be fresh and hopefully relatable, regardless of whether you’re just starting out or midway through your collegiate career. I hope you find this helpful and enjoy reading through it!

When tensions in the crew were at their highest, how did the guys treat you? Was there ever a point where you were the target of their frustration? (Side question, when during the Olympic cycle was everyone on-edge the most? Was it during the selection period, in the lead-up to the Olympics…?)

“The most tense time was always mid-spring of the Olympic year. By that point everyone had invested a whole lot of themselves and it was becoming clear who would make it, who would not, and who was right on the cut line. The athletes on the line had it worst, since, perhaps oddly, their fate was mostly out of their hands. All they could do was try to stay cool, pull their asses off, and hope things broke their way. The top athletes were focused on getting faster and staying healthy. The “cuts” were looking forward to pair trials and going to the shore with their girlfriends after it was all over.

As for me, I was always treated as an integral part of the team. The only time I caught any heat from the guys was if I made a mistake, or if some random new guy just blew a gasket in a moment of frustration. If I made a mistake, I owned it, apologized and resolved never to do it again. The guys held me to the same standards that they held themselves. Obviously, they were not happy with any miscue, but I think they respected the fact that I gave it everything and did not make excuses when I came up short. In the other case, new guys who could not take the heat had short half-lives. Teti definitely selected for composure under pressure. The more someone got wound up, the more Mike would push his buttons. There was a dark humor to it, and those guys either figured out they were getting played, or they blew up.”

If there was ever a point where the rowers started directing their frustration towards you, was that something that you shut down right away or something you just brushed aside since you knew it was the frustration of training talking and not so much the rowers personal feelings coming out?

It was really situational. If I got called out for substandard performance, then I took responsibility for it. If it was someone blowing off steam, I usually made fun of them and reminded them to lighten up. That works well as long as you have their respect and your response does not hit too close to home. People have a chuckle and everyone gets back to business.

There were certain times, usually when tensions were already high, where I would be the go-between for the athletes and the coaches, delivering messages no one wanted to hear. In those times, no one was really happy with me. It was the least fun part of the process, but my role was to help us win, not to be buddies or blow sunshine.

For example, one day Mike wanted to do race pieces for the third day in a row. I knew the guys were already tapped out. Mike asked me if the crew was all jacked up for timed pieces and I told him, no, they were exhausted but would throw everything into the workout and then go home to crash. At first he was miffed, but he countered with, “If you guys break X time in the first piece, the workout is over.” We beat the time, and I think he said, “Let’s just do one more short piece flat out.” Then the workout was really over. We ended up doing less than half of the planned distance, but it worked out.

Being truthful and direct in those interactions is not only the right thing to do. Over time I learned it was also a competitive advantage, even if it meant telling a good friend something awful, like “No, I don’t think you have a path from here to make the team,” or “Athlete X is injured but won’t tell you.” They remember and appreciate that you leveled with them.

When a rower or the crew as a whole was having an off day what was your strategy, if you had one, for getting things back on track and getting the crew re-focused without getting an onslaught of criticism, emotions, etc. thrown at you? Did Teti ever get involved or were you expected to handle it on your own?

My teammates and I occasionally got what Bryan Volpenhein called “the shanks.” Sometimes the only cure was time. We just had to ride it out, and we relied on one another to help us recover. If someone had a really strong track record of winning, Teti would cut them some slack where they had time to rehab themselves. My role there was to help them get back on form as quickly and with as little drama as possible…unless I was the one with the shanks, which did happen once or twice.

If a whole crew was getting slaughtered, I would try to break things down into the smallest possible unit of achievable progress and then drive them toward that. It might be things like “let’s be first off line on the next piece,” or “no matter where we are, let’s neutralize the other crew’s move and then sell it to move on them.” Even if we still lost the piece, even a little win can spur some confidence. A couple athletes in the crew get fired up and that becomes contagious. It takes persistence to find something that lights a spark, but that strategy worked better than any of the others I tried.

Teti never missed a trick, and if a crew was having a bad day, he would give us some time to get it together. A big, common goal was to figure it out before Mike decided you needed his help. If things got that far, you were entering a world of pain.

How did you avoid having “the shanks” interfere with your coxing, particularly on days when everyone was having an off day and tensions were high all around? If there was an instance where it did interfere, did you handle it the same way as before (taking responsibility when someone called you out) or a different way?

As the cox, when you have the shanks, you have to do your best to minimize the impact on the crew, and get yourself back on track as quickly as possible. My version of the shanks was magically forgetting how to go straight. In Teti’s system, going straight was the coxswain’s job #1. It is difficult and you have to practice it. When the shanks happened I would go to as much “silent time” as the crew could handle, and focus my attention on getting my mechanics back. If we were doing pieces, I had drills for myself, namely, taking my hands completely off the ropes and putting them on the outsides of the gunwales. My aim was to get myself back together as quickly as I could, which meant not panicking.

If the whole crew is having a bad day, the cox is expected to lead the crew out of it, or at at a minimum, get them focused on some relevant aspect of rowing. If you can do that, you can mitigate the damage, and then you just take your lumps. It is not personal. It is what happens when you underperform. Accept that you had a crap outing, lick your wounds and put it behind you, then come back for the next row ready to go.

What’s your strategy/advice to keep tense situations from escalating to the point where the rowers go off on the easiest target (usually their coxswain) and/or for preventing it from happening in the first place? Does it really all go back to simple mutual respect for your teammates?

Respect and trust are such huge parts of coxing. If you don’t have those things with your crew, you are a sitting duck. But they must be earned over time. Working hard on coxing fundamentals and being the person who looks out for the well-being of your athletes goes a long way. By looking out, I mean helping them get faster. If the coach has identified flaws in their rowing, work with the athletes to fix them as quickly and calmly as possible. Calm athletes can make changes. Tense people cannot.

I don’t think it is possible to completely avoid getting hammered by the athletes every now and again. What is possible is to build that respect and trust so the rowers know they have their own work to do before coming after someone else, namely the cox.

What advice do you have for junior/collegiate coxswains who may be dealing with rowers who feel like the only way to blow off steam is to blame them for every little thing that goes wrong, keeping in mind that younger coxswains tend to have a harder time maintaining a poker face and not giving in to how the rowers’ treatment makes them feel? At what point do you feel it’s gone past being something they could/should handle on their own and instead needs to be brought to the coach’s attention?

Be honest with yourself, and take athletes’ comments seriously, but not to heart. The former is a behavior change any aspiring champion must embrace; the latter is hard, since emotions form a huge part of our initial reactions and they generally run hot.

When they challenge your coxing, come right back and ask: “What can I do better? How should I do it? Coach me and I will work my ass off to improve.” If you take criticism seriously, you train your athletes to give only serious criticism. If you are willing to be coached – which intrinsically means accepting that your coxing is not perfect – and can show that you can make improvements, too, you will get massive respect points. From first principles, racing is about going as fast as you possibly can. Winning is just a byproduct of that. Starting here, getting coached (even harshly) and making changes are simply parts of the process.

Going back to my first answer, there is a difference between the national team and youth/college programs. In our case, the coach ruthlessly weeded out temperaments that would be liabilities at Worlds and the Olympics. Most other programs do not have that luxury, since they need the butts in seats or the massive erg score that occasionally comes with an outsized ego. If something is bothering you with one of the athletes, then my suggestion is to address it one-on-one first, as above – find out what the beef is and see if you can make an improvement. If that does not work, ask a respected crewmate to help you work it out with the person. If it escalates to the coach, you have a major problem. One of you is likely gone, and unfortunately the cox usually loses out. Our job is to glue the team together and lead them. If we cannot do that, someone else will at least get a chance at it.

If there are any rowers and coaches reading this, let me point out that rowers improve faster than coxswains, especially early on. Think of how often second-year rowers make the varsity. I bet you know of several. Now think of some second-year coxswains who made the varsity. Probably not too many. The right answer to this is to coach your coxswains as rigorously as you coach your athletes. Don’t just rely on someone figuring it out on their own. It’s not complicated and pays dividends as the season progresses toward championship racing.

That last paragraph is really important and definitely something that I hope coaches take into consideration. It also reiterates the point I’ve been making for the last two years that you have to coach your coxswains and give them the tools to succeed just as you do with the rowers.

I hope you guys enjoyed that and as I said earlier, are able to taking something away from it that you can incorporate into how you work with your crews. If you’ve got any questions or a follow-up on something that was discussed, feel free to comment below or shoot me an email.

Pete, thanks again so much for your support and your help with this!

Image via // World Rowing

Coxing

Coxswain skills: Kill your darlings

By readyallrow August 5, 2014

One of the most frustrating things for me as a coxswain is coming up with a call that I think is really great and just what the boat needs to hear only to have it fall flat when I actually use it. Sometimes coming up with calls is a spur-of-the-moment thing but more often they’re the result of a lot of time spent reflecting on things outside of practice. I’ll think about what happened at practice that week, what drills we did, what pieces we did, how the rowers felt each day, what the boat felt like, what the coach was saying, what our goals are, what inspires us, what pisses us off, etc. and try to make a list of at least 5–10 things that I can use the next few times we go out.

This isn’t a daily ritual, rather it’s a weekly or bi-weekly habit that I got into around my sophomore year of high school and have more or less maintained since then whenever I’m regularly coxing. Half of what I come up with are short one or two word technical phrases (my personal definition of what a “call” is) and the other half are 3–5+ word phrases that I use to evoke some kind of emotion from the rowers, either individually or as a group. Out of this list there’s usually one or two calls that I think are my magnum opuses (for that week at least).

The key to creating a list like this is that you implement the calls as needed. You want to space them out and let yourself say them naturally, rather than trying to force yourself to use it, if that makes sense. Showing restraint when you’re convinced this is the greatest call you’re ever gonna make can be tough but if the timing, emotion, and delivery’s not there, it’s never gonna be successful anyways.

My“darlings” were nearly always calls that I wanted to use towards the end of a piece when I knew my crew was clawing for every last inch we were getting. There were many times when I’d use them and they’d get just the response I wanted — I could feel the boat pick up, I could see my stern pair grit their teeth and get after it, I could hear the catches sharpen up — but there were just as many times where either nothing happened or worse, things would just fall apart.

When I’d ask the rowers for feedback, sometimes they’d say “oh man, that call has to stay … it was perfect” and other times they’d say “eh…it wasn’t terrible but it didn’t really do much for me”. The positive visual and verbal feedback instantaneously reinforced that that was a call I should keep but the neutral or negative feedback never seemed to register as quickly. I always thought “OK it didn’t work/they didn’t like it this time but that’s just because [excuses] … I’ll hold on to it and try again later. This call’s just too good to not keep using.” So that’s what I’d do. I’d keep trying to work it into my vocabulary and keep trying to make it work, even though what I was seeing and hearing was telling me that it was having the opposite effect.

And that’s where the phrase “kill your darlings” comes in. It is a phrase most commonly attributed to William Faulkner as he is quoted as saying “In writing, you must kill all your darlings”. The best and easiest explanation of its meaning that I’ve found is this: “His advice admonishes against being so attached to a piece that it is sent to be published on impulse based on only the writer’s high opinion of how great it is. This impulse can be something that lasts for not mere seconds but actually over long periods of time. The idea is that there is an emotional connection making it dear for the author, but this does not translate for the readers by default.”

In layman’s terms, don’t try to put something out these just because you think it’s great because your opinion of it has likely caused you to develop an attachment to it that other people won’t have. The same applies to coxing. You spend time coming up with things to say to your rowers and because of that, you’re determined to use them and make them work. You’ve become attached to them because you’ve convinced yourself that they’re great simply because they’ve been repeated in your head over and over and over and over again.

This has happened to me so. many. times. There were times where I was so convinced that this call was the call that I’d keep trying to use it and someone in my boat would have to eventually go all Regina George and tell me to stop trying to make “fetch” happen because it was never going to happen. It was those moments, among others, where I had to just sit back and accept that I wasn’t getting the response I wanted or needed and it was more important to let go of this call and find something else to say than to keep beating the proverbial dead horse.

Another explanation of Faulker’s quote says “you have to get rid of your most precious and especially self-indulgent passages for the greater good of your literary work”. For the greater good of your crew, you can’t keep indulging yourself by saying things that clearly aren’t working, regardless of how great they sound in theory or what you hope the boat’s response will be. It’s not all about you, just like writing a novel isn’t all about the author. They’re writing for the masses and to an extent, you’re coxing for the masses (albeit a much smaller one) and that’s who you have to make your words work for.

So, here’s my challenge for you. Talk to your rowers, listen to your recordings, and think about the things you’re saying. You’ll likely be able to pick out at least two or three calls that just aren’t doing anything for anyone. Additionally, if you find yourself saying the same phrase to the point of excess (you’ll know it when you hear it) … get rid of it, as much as you might like it or have grown accustomed to using it. It does nothing for the crew to keep repeating things that aren’t generating the response you want, regardless of whether it’s mental or physical. Don’t think of it as scrapping your entire coxing lexicon either. Instead, look at it like writing a paper — practice is your time to proofread, edit, and revise so that you have your best, most polished piece of work on hand on race day.

Image via // @ryanjnicholsonphoto

Coxing Q&A Teammates & Coaches

Question of the Day

By readyallrow July 13, 2013

I’m doing a rowing camp at Yale and my coach there told us coxes to count at the finish rather than at the catch. It’s hard to find time to make calls to bring intensity to the drive as such, and I feel like the rowers have weaker drives when I talk calmly to them during the recovery about slide control and “easy catches”. Do you have any suggestions concerning counting at the finish, or possibly any recordings?

I’d talk to the coach and say that you’re used to calling them a different way and you’re curious as to why they like for them to be called at the finish vs. the catch. Do not be that person that says “well, that’s now how we do it on my team” – I swear, that type of rower/coxswain is at the top of most coaches shit list and once you’re there it is hard to get off it. Tell them that it’s a little awkward for you because you’re not sure how to make certain calls and do they have any advice that might help you out. Also tell them what you’ve noticed about the weaker drives, etc.

If you can, talk to the rowers you’ve been with before you talk to your coach and ask them what they think. How are they used to having things called, in their experience do they think one works better than the other, have they noticed anything (either good or bad) from calls being made at the finish instead of the catch when you guys have been out, etc. Take all that info and talk about it with your coach. It’ll be good for them to know too because it’ll help them know what to focus on during practice.

These camps are meant to teach you something and this is a great learning opportunity that you should definitely take advantage of. Asking questions is part of your job and something you should be doing anyways if something comes up that you don’t understand. Don’t be nervous to talk to the coach about it either. They’ll most likely appreciate the initiative and willingness to understand and learn how to do something that you’re not used to doing.

It’s hard to know what recordings I have where the coxswain calls things at the finish. I don’t think it’s anything I’ve really paid attention to. If there’s video with the recording it’s always easy to see where they’re called but it’s obviously tougher with just the audio. Plus, calling things at the finish is rare, at least in my experience. Like I said in the question I linked to up above, I only do it when I really want the focus to be on something at the front end of the stroke.

My suggestion again is to talk to your coach and get some advice from him/her and then try to apply what you talked about with them in the boat. It’s definitely going to require going out of your comfort zone a bit but you should be in the habit of doing that regularly anyways. Talk to the rowers and say that it’s something you’re going to try so they know why things might be weird for a bit and then get some feedback from them after practice. Keep talking about it with your coach(es) and ask them on the water after you’ve called a power 10 or something what they thought, how was that, etc.

Coxing Q&A

Question of the Day

By readyallrow July 6, 2013

Hey there, I have a question about coxing. I’ve been coxing for a couple years now and just realized that I call my calls on different times. I mean, for power 10’s I’ll call the numbers when they are half way through the drive to the finish. But for starts, I will call the numbers at the catch such as (1/2, 1/2, 3/4, full, full) as well as 10 highs at the catch. I don’t know if I’m doing this right, but I’ve always done it this way and my crew goes with it. How do you personally do it?

Everybody does this a little differently. If something’s been working for you and your crew, don’t feel pressured to change it. I was taught to call everything right at the catch so regardless of whether I’m calling starts, power 10s, etc. I always call everything as the blade enters the water. The only exception is if I’m trying to get the the rowers to focus on their catches or something else that happens up at the front end, I’ll say sharp one, sharp two, sharp three…” or something to that effect instead of saying the number first. Saying “sharp” kind of loses its power if you’re saying it halfway through the drive, which I noticed was happening when I’d call the strokes right at the catch.

The reason I don’t call things in the middle of the stroke is because I found it always caused people to rush into the next stroke … and it’s just sloppy. When I was a novice (and probably the first time I ever called a power 10) I did this and my coach corrected me on it immediately. From the launch he could see the rowers rushing up the slide to match their catches to when I was saying the stroke number so after that he explained why calling things right at the catch was more appropriate/effective and that’s the way I’ve done it ever since.

I try to be really consistent about when I call things and when I made the adjustment to calling the numbers at the finish in these instances my eight definitely noticed. I explained why I was doing it though and they thought it made sense. The key is to just keep them in-the-know about what you’re doing if you decide to change something. Like I said though, if you’ve been doing something that’s been working for your boat, even if it’s slightly unconventional, don’t feel pressured to change it. If you want to try doing it a different way, tell them that ahead of time and then let them know if you decide to revert back to what you were doing previously or if you decide to stick with the new way.