Tag: qotd

Q&A Teammates & Coaches

Question of the Day

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Hey, so I’m team captain of a high school team in the South. Recently, we got a transplant teammate from up north. Though he was out of shape to begin with (the move having disrupted his training) he has worked really hard and put in a ton of effort at every practice, and has made a lot of progress in the limited time he’s been here. However, when our coach released the roster for the travel team (we don’t take the whole team to away regattas) the new kid wasn’t on there. I think it has been a pretty big disappointment – it denies him any chance at youth nationals and means that he will only race twice in the spring season, which doesn’t at all reflect his dedication and commitment.

My co-captain and I personally feel this is unfair, and there have been complaints from my teammates along the same lines. His attitude is better and his erg scores and technique are more competitive than some of the guys that have made the travel team, and I know that we have space in the bus/hotel/etc. However, who makes the travel team is 100% not my call. I definitely feel wary of questioning a coaching decision and don’t want to undermine our coach’s authority and respect. Should I say anything to our coach about possibly including our new teammate on the travel team? And if so, how could I approach it in a way that doesn’t seem like I’m out of line or being disrespectful?

PS – Thank you so much for writing your blog – it’s seriously helped my development as a coxswain in any number of different ways and now we’re using your recordings section to teach our novices. It’s definitely appreciated.

The first thing you’ve got to find out (if you haven’t already) is how your new teammate feels about all of this. Don’t assume he’s disappointed, actually talk to him and find out how he feels. Does he feel like he’s being treated unfairly given the hard work he’s put in or is he OK with how things worked out given the fact that he’s the new guy on the team? The only reason I say this is because you don’t want it to turn into a situation where you think you’re helping him out but in reality you’re potentially only making things worse. (If you’ve ever seen The Incredibles, it’s kind of like when Mr. Incredible saved the guy that didn’t want to be saved.) If he’s OK with you saying something, then fine. If he’s not comfortable with it, let it go. If he’s not comfortable with you guys saying anything but he’s still unsure of why he was left off the team, encourage him to talk to the coach and offer to go with him as moral support.

All that aside, I think being team captain gives you a little more … legitimacy, I suppose … in questioning your coach’s decision. Maybe not directly questioning it but at the very least, getting some clarification on it. I look at team captains the same way I do assistant coaches. I feel like assistant coaches are there to back up the coach’s decisions but at the same time, question them when they don’t feel like they were necessarily the right ones. The worst thing you can do as team captain, in my opinion at least, is be a lemming and not speak up for your teammates when it’s necessary. The coaches don’t always have an ear to the ground with the team like you guys do so if you’re hearing something that we aren’t, I would hope that you’d bring it to my attention so I can address it.

Like you said though, you do have to be cautious in doing this because you don’t want it to come off as you questioning or undermining their authority. Assuming you’ve been on the team long enough to know your coach’s personality, that’ll clue you in on how best to approach it. If they’re fairly laid back and you’ve built up a good relationship with them then you can probably get right to the point. If they’re more … aggressive … then you’ll probably have to spend some time carefully phrasing what you want to say so as to not come off as being (in their eyes) insubordinate. The coaches have complete discretion over their team and the decisions they make and I respect that but I also don’t think that that means they shouldn’t be questioned from time to time. And as I’ve said in the past many, many times, if they want to maintain an atmosphere where their athletes feel like they can approach them with issues like this or whatever else comes up, the willingness to be transparent about why they do the things they do is pretty important.

It’s also important that you go into this with the realization that it is very, very, very, very, very unlikely that anything is going to change. If someone’s already been told that they’re on the team that will be traveling, you can’t really expect the coach to take them off in favor of someone else unless they do something so egregious that the coach has no choice but to remove them. That’s not to say thought that it’s not worth it to speak up. The worst they can say is “no”.

My approach would probably go something like this. First, set up a captains and coaches meeting for either before or after practice (guesstimate that it’ll run for about 20 minutes and plan accordingly). Assuming you have a head coach and an assistant coach, ask both of them to be there, if possible. Go in with your co-captain (make sure you’re both on the same page with everything) and say that you wanted to talk about the travel team and get some clarification on how the coaches decided who was going to be on the roster because there had been some talk amongst the team about it and before you brought up the issues that were brought to your attention, you wanted to hear straight from them what their thought process was in determining who would and wouldn’t make the team. Listen to what they have to say and try to see if you can make the connection between why certain people were left off the roster and others were put on based on what the coaches were looking for during the selection process.

When they’re done, thank them for explaining everything (because they definitely didn’t have to if they felt it was unnecessary or none of your business) and then bring up the concerns you have. Preface it by saying that you’re obviously not trying to undermine them or anything, but over the last few days/week/whatever time frame you’re working with, you both heard your teammates voicing some discontent and felt that it was your responsibility as team captains to bring that to their attention. (I wouldn’t say anything about the people with lower erg scores, worse technique, etc. or knowing that you have space on the bus and in the hotel because all of that is beside the point.)

Tell them about what you’ve seen regarding your new teammate in terms of his dedication, effort, attitude, work ethic, etc. and based on all of that, in addition to him appearing to have all the qualities the coaches were looking for (assuming what you’ve seen aligns with what they said when they explained their selection process), you and your teammates felt that it was unfair to leave him off the team. (I know that if I were in charge of a decision like that and I had the team captains telling me that a significant portion of the team felt that someone who was left off the roster deserved to be on it, I would be taking a step back and reevaluating my decision.)

Let your coaches know that you understand that the decision on who does and doesn’t travel is completely up to them but because there are things that go on that you hear/see that they don’t, you thought it was worth bringing up to them in the hope that this particular teammate could be given additional consideration. At the very least, maybe propose the idea of using him as an alternate when you travel just in case something happens and someone from the original roster is unable to row. Once you’ve done all that, thank them again for talking with you and then leave. Assuming you finish the meeting feeling like it was productive and you handled the situation maturely, you don’t want to press your luck by badgering them for an immediate response. (Even if you don’t feel like the meeting went well, you should still leave without pressing the issue further.) After a day or two, ask them if they’ve given any more consideration to what you talked about and see what they say. Regardless of their final decision, you have to respect it and move on.

The other key thing is that whatever you discuss stays in the room you discussed it in. Don’t leave and then go tell your teammates what you talked about, what the coaches said regarding their decision-making process, etc. because inevitably someone is going to get pissed and say “well, I do all that stuff, why didn’t I make the team” or they’ll take what they heard, go tell someone else, and eventually what was actually said is so twisted and convoluted that it doesn’t even resemble the original conversation. If people ask you what you said or what you talked about, just say “nothing important, just team captain stuff” and leave it at that. The best way to shoot yourself in the foot is to have a productive conversation with your coaches, leave having them thinking that they made the right call in choosing the two of you to be co-captains, and then have them find out after the fact that you two were the start of the rumor mill that they now have to waste practice time shutting down.

I think it’s a good thing that the two of you are considering saying something. I understand why you’re cautious about doing so but I think if you approach it in a mature fashion, you’ll be alright. Like I said, it might not change anything but at least it won’t be for lack of trying. I’d rather have captains on my team that say something when they feel like something needs to be said and not get the results they want than have captains who just sit back and let stuff happen. It’s the act of being a captain vs. being a captain in title only.

College Coxing Q&A

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This might be a tough one: I’m a coxswain on my college team. After years, I’m finally coxing our first varsity boat. That’s the good news. The bad news is I’m dealing with a lot right now – I’ve been suffering from anxiety and depression as well as dealing with losing a best friend to suicide roughly a year ago. My anxiety is generally much worse during spring season because races where I have to weigh in freak me out. I am about 110, 5’4″ but a lot of our coxswains barely come up to my shoulders and I worry my coach will replace me if they weigh less than I do!

I’ve been seriously considering taking this season off to get my head together, but every time I decide to do it, I become convinced my coach will question my competency or tell me not to come back. As a side detail – I really love crew I’ve been part of the sport since eighth grade, I rowed up until college. I really want to coach high school or juniors rowing after I graduate and I’d hate to do anything to undermine my position on the team and I’m afraid to let my teammates down! Any ideas? Thanks!

At the start of this school year my brother, who is a sophomore in college, also lost a good friend to suicide. It took him quite awhile to get over the initial pang of guilt, anger, and sadness that he felt and while I can’t presume to know what that feels like, from the outside looking in I know that it was a really rough situation for him, as I imagine it is for you. One of the things that helped him through it was talking to one of the counselors in the student health center as his school. Everybody deals with stuff like this in their own way but it’s something I’d recommend looking into, even if you’re a little weary about it at first. He wasn’t too keen on the idea when I initially brought it up but it ended up being a good thing for him to do. Even if you only go one time, you never know … it might help.

Same goes for dealing with anxiety, depression, etc. I think everyone, myself included, feels one of three things when it comes to stuff like that: a) if you ignore it eventually you won’t “feel” it anymore and you won’t have to worry about it, b) you have to hide it from other people to avoid being judged, pitied, mocked, ridiculed, diminished, or brushed off, or c) we’re old enough that we should be able to figure out how to deal with it on our own without outside help.

Regardless of which of those three categories you fall into, everyone can probably agree that no one ever comes out better on the other side as a result of following one of those paths. Most, if not all, colleges and universities have mental health services (or just student health services in general) already factored into your tuition, meaning that you’ve essentially already paid for X number of sessions with a counselor simply by being enrolled. I’d look into that and see what it’s like for your school. If that’s the case, take advantage of it.

As far as your weight goes … this is such an unbelievably infuriating topic. For starters, weighing in should never cause anyone any kind of anxiety. Sure, if you gorged on burgers and mozzarella sticks the night before you might wake up feeling a little nervous but that’s a lot different than experiencing an all out panic attack over it. You’re 110lbs, which is the minimum for coxswains. If you’re under that you have to carry weight in the boat with you anyways so that you meet the minimum, THUS your coach replacing you with someone lighter than you is completely redundant because they’re just gonna have to fill up a sandbag so the scale reads 110lbs when they get on it.

Height has nothing to do it with it. Yea, pocket-sized coxswains are the norm because you don’t normally see tall women rocking a 110lb frame and it’s hard/uncomfortable to contort your body to fit in a seat made for someone several inches shorter than you. Tall coxswains do exist though because the more important variable is your weight (i.e. your ability to be as close to racing weight as possible on race day), not your height. I know saying “don’t worry about it” doesn’t mean much but on your list of things that you should be concerning yourself with, this really shouldn’t even be on there. Besides, weight isn’t a measure of how skilled a coxswain is, which is where the real focus should lie.

Here’s the thing about coaches: they’re supposed to assume that you are competent and capable rather than assuming the opposite. They’re supposed to be there for you outside of practice to be someone to talk to or offer advice if you’re having problems. They’re not supposed to be some hard-nosed person that you can only see for 15-20 hours a week and are afraid to talk to because you think their immediate reaction is going to be scoffing at your question or telling you to leave and not come back. I hate that there are coaches out there that act like that but what I hate even more are the coaches that tell other coaches that’s how they should act. It sets a bad precedent and frankly, it’s bullshit. I refuse to coach like that.

Everybody goes through things in life that cause you to have to make certain choices … take time off, walk away from an opportunity, etc. In this context, your coach (and teammates) should be supportive of your decision, even if he’s not happy about it or it messes with his lineups, because presumably he wants the best for you. If he questioned how competent of a coxswain you are or told you not to bother coming back after you said everything you said in your original question, I don’t know why you’d want to row for someone like that.

If you think that taking time off would be the right decision for you then try approaching it with your assistant coach first (with an agreement ahead of time that whatever you discuss stays between the two of you). Give your coaches the benefit of the doubt that they will be supportive and will welcome you back in the fall. When I was in school I was surprised at how many student-athletes would take time off to study abroad, deal with personal issues, focus on school if they were taking particularly hard classes that semester, etc. It’s not a ton of people but it’s more than you think. If that is what you’re planning on doing though you’ve gotta let your coaches know ASAP. The only time I would truly justify a coach getting upset over something like this is if you told him/her at the last second, right before or after racing season started. I wouldn’t let that affect your decision but just know that they might be initially annoyed that you waited so long to say something.

With coaching after graduation, I’ve found that I get more shit from other coaches (not all of them, just a few) about having not coxed the entire way through college than I do from the people I’m coaching. No one I’ve coached has ever thought it was a big deal or detracted from my ability to teach them how to row or cox. As long as you make an effort to relate to them, treat them with respect, don’t act like you’re superior to them in every conceivable way, and are able to communicate what you know, they will most likely embrace you as their coach. I try really hard to learn about the stuff I’m not as familiar with and think I do a pretty good job of conveying what I do know.

I’ve had other coaches make really snarky comments towards me, treat me like I’m completely new to the sport, or blatantly parade the fact that they’re a “four year varsity athlete at such and such school” every time the topic comes up but honestly, I’ve gotten to the point where I’m starting to just not care. If you think you’re so much better than me or any other coach because you’ve got a few years of racing on us then so be it. I’ve also worked with coaches who couldn’t care less that I didn’t cox all four years. Someone I met last year started rowing when he was a junior in college and only had two years of experience in the sport before he started coaching. I can totally understand wanting to hire someone with X number of years of experience but I think as long as you can demonstrate that you know what you’re talking about, you’ll be fine.

Coxing Drills Masters Q&A Rowing Technique

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I recently had an anxiety attack in the boat (they didn’t notice and it was still safe). Part of the reason may have been because I’m not sure what to say. I’m good at short calls but as a junior coxing adult men (average age 45) I lack the confidence to make long calls and exercises that weren’t given to me. Do you have any suggestions of calls I could start with? We have been focusing on control on the slide and finishes. 🙂 Thank you!

Regardless of whether anyone noticed or not, coxswains having an anxiety attack in the boat isn’t safe, no matter how minor it is. It’s just not. I have anxiety (and panic attacks) too so I know it’s not something you have a lot of control over but that’s part of the problem – you don’t really have any control over what’s happening, which is also what tends to exacerbate some people’s anxiety in those situations, and it can leave you feeling distracted, dizzy, etc. (neither things that you want your coxswain to be feeling ever).

I’ve heard several stories from coaches about people having panic attacks in the boat and it can go from relatively minor and “I’m OK *deep breath* I’m OK…” to pretty serious and “We’ve gotta get him/her outta the boat now” (which they’ve gotta try to do while the person is sitting there having a combined panic/asthma attack). It’s just not something that you want to risk have happening, for the sake of that person especially, but also for the rest of the crew. You also don’t want to have  your entire practice derailed either because of it but most people tend to not want to say that out of fear of being seen as “insensitive” to the issue (even though that’s a legitimate concern).

Not to minimize your situation but if you’re having an anxiety attack in part because you’re not sure what calls to make, as a coach, that would make me question your ability to handle being a coxswain in general or at the very least, your ability to cox a masters crew. Before you do anything else though I would really advise you to talk with the coach of that crew (if you haven’t already) and let him/her know that coxing them is intimidating to you and either figure out a plan for the two of you to communicate more on the workouts or to find another coxswain who can handle working with them. Jumping from coxing high school crews to masters can be tough at first and not everyone is cut out for it. It doesn’t mean you’re a bad coxswain or anything if you’re not but if it’s becoming too overwhelming to the point where you’re having a panic attack (or multiple attacks) while you’re on the water over something as simple as making calls, you really owe it to them to relinquish the seat to someone who is better equipped to cox them.

As a junior, assuming you’ve been coxing for three years now, you should have a solid arsenal of calls and drills in your back pocket that you can pull out if/when you need them. The coach should obviously let you know what he wants to do that day but he shouldn’t need to spoon-feed his coxswain every workout he wants done, drill he wants called, or call he wants made. If that’s what he has to do he might as well take out coxless small boats.

I’m not sure if by exercises you meant the actual workout or drills so I’ll try to hit both of those. Workouts are completely dependent on your crew’s training plan for the week (assuming you have one). When in doubt if you aren’t given a workout to do with them or you’re sent off on your own and told to put them through something, just do a long steady state piece, particularly if you’ve been focusing a lot on technique lately. 2×20, 3×15, at 18-22spm etc. are good ones to do.

As far as drills go, double pause drills are great for slide control (I like to pause at hands away and 1/2 slide) as are exaggerated slides, assuming your crew is skilled enough to row with good technique at borderline-obnoxiously low stroke rates (think 12-14spm). Catch-placement drills are another fun drill to do that help work on slide control. The main focus is on catch-timing (hence the name) but moving the slides together on the recovery is obviously a pretty big part of that.

When I make calls for the recovery/slide control, I like to draw out whatever I’m saying and get them to match their recovery length to the length of whatever I’m saying. I’ll say “relax”, “control”, “smooth”, “long”, “patience”, etc. for about three strokes, which gives the stroke a chance to match up his slide speed with my voice and for everyone else to fall in line with him. From there I’ll call it like that as I need to. The biggest thing I try to remind them of is that in order to have any forward momentum, they’ve got to have good ratio. You can’t have good ratio unless you’re patient on the recovery.

Another thing to remind them is that on the recovery they shouldn’t be pulling themselves into the catch or really doing that much work at all; all you’ve gotta do is let the boat run under you. If you looked out of the boat at the shoreline while on the recovery it should almost look/feel like you’re not even moving because you’re letting the boat do all the work.

For the finish, it depends on what you’re working on – clean releases, getting a good send at the end of the drive, etc. For clean releases, simple square-blade rowing is probably the most basic drill you can do because all you’ve gotta do is apply weight with the outside hand to extract the blade. You could also do this with the outside hand only if you wanted. Posture is critical when working on finishes too so make sure that’s something you’re making calls for.

Another drill is rowing with feet out since you’ve gotta have a solid finish with the arms to help you maintain your connection to the stretchers on the last part of the stroke. It’s not strictly a “finishes” drill but my coaches have always used it to help enforce good finish posture in my boats when we’ve been working on that part of the stroke. If you’re working on building power throughout the drive and finishing the stroke off with the max amount of send, you could do half-pressure catches building into full-pressure finishes. Not only does that work on quick catches but it also helps them feel the acceleration on the drive, all culminating in a full-pressure finish.

Coxing Novice Q&A Teammates & Coaches

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The cox on our boat (novice 8) is annoyingly unfocused a lot of the time – she doesn’t listen to our coach about our drills, she complains a lot which wastes our water time, she always has the wrong cox box or attachment, and she always chats to stroke seat instead of leading us. The boys’ team said they had similar problems when she coxed them last term. Should I speak to her or our coach and what should I say?

This is one of those situations where you have to tread lightly because you never know how the other person is going to take it – they can either accept the feedback and do something different, ignore it, or run to your coach and say you’re ganging up on or bullying them. If you have team captains I would first bring it up with them, say what you said up above, and ask if they would mind saying something to her and letting her know that the rowers are getting frustrated so she needs to start being more attentive and focused. Since they have slightly more experience than you do it might be easier/better for them to address it first than for someone of equal standing (aka you) to bring it up. Plus, you’re each others peers and no matter how harsh you’ve gotta be, its always better to hear stuff like this from your teammates than from your coach(es).

If you don’t have team captains I would ask maybe one or two other rowers from the boat to come with you when you talk to her. Try to pull her aside after practice one day and let her know that her behavior is distracting to everyone else in the boat and it’s becoming more and more apparent that she’s not as focused as she needs to be. Having the wrong equipment, not listening to the coach, calling drills wrong, talking to the stroke when she shouldn’t be, etc. is frustrating to you guys because its not possible for you to do what you need to do if the person who’s supposed to be leading you is giving off an “I don’t care” attitude. You shouldn’t be afraid to be frank about that either – you have every right to be upset if your coxswain’s not doing what he/she needs to do. I would avoid bringing up anything about knowing how she was with the guys because that’ll make it seem like you’re all talking about her behind her back, which will just make the situation worse.

If after talking to her nothing changes (I’d give it at least a week), then I would go to your coach with the same two or three people you originally brought with you and tell them what’s going on. Let them know that you’ve talked with her or asked the team captains to say something to her and nothing changed. It’s likely that they’re frustrated as well with her not listening to them, having the wrong cox box, etc. so hopefully none of this would be news to them.

Novice Q&A

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I joined my university rowing club with the intention of rowing for them, however, as the club is very small and I coxed a little in autumn, I find myself being asked to cox, both for my squad (novice women) and the two senior squads. I’m 5ft10 and 125lbs, so really quite big for a cox. I really don’t want to lose my place in the main novice eight if I’m never going to be a decent cox, but equally, I’m not the strongest in the boat (probably around 4th based on technique and ergs) so coxing might be a good way to go. I don’t know whether to dedicate myself to coxing, and accept I’ll be on the large side, or stick to rowing. Could you shed any light on the frequency and success of coxes who aren’t pocket sized? Thank you.

I personally don’t know too many non-pocket sized coxswains but the ones that come to mind were all lightweight rowers that switched to coxing due to an injury. They didn’t do too bad with it, the only problem they had was fitting in the seat since they were several inches taller than the average coxswain. Even though coxswains usually are pretty tiny, it’s the weight that matters more than anything else. A good number of men that cox are in the 5’8″ to 5’10” range (Zach Vlahos, the senior men’s coxswain, is 5’9″…) so it’s definitely feasible if you wanted to keep doing it.

If you’re fourth on the ergs you’re in the upper part of the the middle of the pack which leads me to assume that if you trained hard enough you could probably be one of the top people in there. Only time can tell whether or not you’re a good coxswain unless you do something so egregious right off the line that your coach decides that it would take more time and effort than it’s worth to teach you to cox than it would to just coach you towards being a stronger rower. I would talk with your coaches and see what they say but if you’ve got the option I’d probably stick with rowing. I would tell your coaches too that you don’t want to lose your spot in the novice 8+ and let them know that your preference is rowing so that they know and can either find someone else to cox or make sure that you’re at least getting an adequate amount of training time with your own boat.

Coxing How To Q&A

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Hey. So I took a boat on the water for the second time ever yesterday, and we hit a nasty cross-course wind that kept blowing me off my point. Every time I’d try to fix it, I’d end up on the other extreme of that point. Any advice for dealing with these kinds of winds?

Crosswinds are a huge pain. When you’re getting hit on the side like that while trying to establish your point, the key is to know exactly what you need to do and who you need to do it so that you can move quickly. The quicker you get your point and start rowing, the less time the wind has to throw you off.

When getting your point in a crosswind you do want to over-correct just a little bit so that when you start rowing the crosswind blows you straight. Once you’re actually rowing, assuming you’re rowing by 6s at the least and with an adequate amount of pressure, it should be fairly easy to maintain your point. When starting out, assuming I’m in a port-stroked boat and am trying to turn towards starboard (the side I’m getting hit on with the wind), I like to have 2-seat row and 7-seat back. It takes some of the pressure off of 2-seat so he doesn’t have to turn the boat himself and adds a bit of power via 7-seat to expedite the process. Having all eight rowers row and back at the same time is too much of a hassle and is going to contribute more pressure than you actually need. More is not better or faster in this situation.

Related: One of my coaches was a coxswain and I got switched out the last third of practice to be in the launch with her. OMG BEST TIME EVER. Every time I had a question she’d answer it so well! More coxes should become coaches! One thing she was talking about was watching the wind patterns – like the dark patches in the water to let the crew know. I understand the concept, but I’m not really understanding why. Like, I tell them that a wind/wake is coming to prepare them?

To get perfectly straight would normally take about two strokes but since we’re getting hit on starboard, we want to over correct a bit so I’d probably take three. In certain circumstances I might take a fourth stroke, although I’ll usually tell them to make the last one an arms only or arms and bodies stroke since I don’t want to over–correct too much. Since I’m trying to over-correct a little bit though I want to shoot for one stroke past straight, meaning if I’m two strokes to starboard I want to correct so I’m one stroke to port. (Hopefully that’s not too confusing.) This will give me enough leeway so that when we start rowing I can either adjust with the rudder or just let the wind push me into being straight.

From here it’s all about using the rudder to stay straight. You can use the rowers to help you adjust if you need to by telling one side or the other to “gimme one hard stroke on this one” but you should do that sparingly since that can really mess up any drills or pieces you’re doing.

Coxing Q&A Teammates & Coaches

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Hey! So I keep getting put in boats that I don’t think I belong in at races/practices, even though the boats that I should be on request me and I’m sure I’m better than the coxswain in those boats. When talking to my coach, he tells me that because we lost a race to a technically slower boat, it is literally all my fault and no one else’s fault even though my boat doesn’t blame me at all, so I shouldn’t be on the faster boats.

I’m so frustrated and just thinking of quitting but I need a reason to not quit because I will regret it if I do. I love this sport yet getting the blame being put entirely on me by my coach unfairly really bothers me. I’m just confused and don’t know what to do anymore. Another note on losing to the slower boat, we lost due to many reasons, most being technique issues in the boat and the other coxswain didn’t even have a cox box so it wasn’t that boat’s coxswain’s calls. Thank you so much. Sorry for the long question, I’m just really frustrated.

Have you tried talking to your coach about this? Blaming coxswains for every single thing that goes wrong in the boat is something that irritates me so much (and not just because I’m a coxswain either). My theory is that unless someone catches a massive crab that completely eliminates you from contention, losing a race is on everyone in the boat, not just one specific person or a couple  specific people. There’s always things that everyone can do better and to put the blame solely on a coxswain not making the right calls or whatever is BS.

Coxswains can only do so much too … like, yes, you’re there to give instructions, make corrections, etc. and you could do that until you’re blue in the face but unless the rowers actually listen to you and make an effort to do something different, things aren’t going to change. You can lead a horse to water but you can’t make them drink is essentially what I’m getting at.

I’d approach him about this and say that as a crew you all agree that the reason you lost was because of technique issues that everyone was having and now that you, as the coxswain, are more aware of what those issues are and what calls to make for them, you feel like you deserve an opportunity to work with them for at least a couple practices to show your coach not only your improved communications skills but also the positive effect that you have on the boat when you’re in there with them. Think about what you contribute to the boat, how you being in there makes them faster, and tell him that. If he doesn’t respond to that or keeps putting you in the other boats … I mean, that’s kind of unfair in my opinion, but you’ve essentially got to accept that that’s the decision he’s made (regardless of whether it’s right, fair, etc.) and commit to working with your new boat to help them go fast.

Going back to what I said about being more aware of the technique issues, make sure you actually are aware of what specifically was causing problems, what the stroke should look like compared to how it looked that day, what you need to tell the rowers to do differently, what calls you would make, and how you would make those calls. Be cognizant of all of that with whatever boat you’re put in and make an effort to be really on top of watching their technique so you can immediately point out something when you see it. Not only will that make you a better coxswain in the long run but it’ll also give your coach an opportunity to watch you with a completely different crew and see that you’re making an effort yourself to do something differently/better than you were before.

Whenever I’m in a boat that’s consistently having technique problems one of the things I always do is re-evaluate how I’m communicating with them and if I’m saying the right things. Even if what I’m saying sounds good to me or good in my head, it might not be resonating with the rowers, which means I’ve gotta either stop using it or reword it so everyone understands what I’m saying. One of the biggest mistakes you can make as a coxswain is continuing to use an ineffective call or saying the same thing over and over with no results. If your coach sees you making an effort to improve that area of your coxing then he might be willing to give you another shot with your original boat.

Ergs Q&A Training & Nutrition

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What are some good erg workouts that you find particularly helpful to lower 2k times?

Steady state! Longer pieces (45-70min total) help to increase your aerobic capacity which in turn allows you to go harder for longer. The key is to do them at a consistent, manageable pace so that your heart rate is consistently in the 140-170bpm range, give or take a little depending on your individual fitness. If you’re going out and doing long pieces but at a high percentage of your max heart rate, you’re most likely going above your anaerobic threshold which is counter-intuitive.

You also want to keep the stroke rates fairly low – somewhere in the 18-22ish range is usually good. If you know your 2k split you want your steady state split to be 16-18ish seconds above that. If you’re going off your 6k split it should be about 10-12 seconds above that.

Some examples of workouts include 7×10′ (2′ off between pieces), 10k at 18-20spm, 3 x 20′, etc. There’s tons of good examples on the /r/rowing sub on Reddit – just search “steady state” and you’ll easily be able to see what other people are doing.

Don’t forget to include interval stuff as well – 8x500m, 4x1k, 1:40 on/0:20 off, etc. In order to row well you’ve got to have a good balance of aerobic and anaerobic fitness so that you can go hard and fast when you need to and then be able to settle into a solid pace for an extended period of time.

Novice Q&A Rowing Technique

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Hi Kayleigh! I have an issue. One thing that coxes and coaches mention quite a bit during pieces, either on the erg or the water, is breathing. I know a lot of people like that, however whenever breathing is mentioned I start thinking about it and my breathing pattern gets screwed up and I have trouble breathing for a few strokes, which in turn screws up my rowing. I don’t want to keep having this problem however I don’t want to say something and be *that* person, especially since I’m new to my team.

Keep it simple – inhale on the recovery, exhale on the drive.

Most of the time coaches and coxswains talk about breathing because it’s an easy thing for rowers to forget to do. Plus, if everyone is inhaling and exhaling at the same time it can help to establish a rhythm in the boat. And, on top of that (but less importantly), it sounds really cool. Not getting caught off guard by them saying something about it really comes down to just being focused on what you’re doing and training yourself to not be so easily distracted. How you go about doing that is up to you. I don’t think it’s an uncommon problem though … I think I’ve known at least 2-3 people at each place I’ve coached that have had the same or a similar problem. If you ask your coach they can probably give you some advice too – that is their job, after all. If you don’t ask, they can’t help you. As a novice you get a pass for not knowing certain things because you’re new so how/why would you know them. You’re only that person if your question is out-of-this-world stupid or the answer is really, really obvious, neither of which apply here.

Coxing Q&A Technique

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Hi Kayleigh. First of all I’d like to say how much I love love love your blog! It has been such a valuable resource, thank you for devoting so much time to it. My question is: I’ve been coxing for about 18 months now and I’m feeling comfortable with steering and basic calls. My coach has asked me to start judging each rower’s technique from what his blade is doing and I’m finding this really hard. Other than looking for timing issues and comparing length against other blades, I’m at a bit of a loss. Do you have any tips? Thanks!

Hi! Technique is the hardest thing to talk about when I haven’t got a visual of some kind right in front of me so apologies if this is kinda vague. The easiest and best way to point out how things should look vs. why something doesn’t look right is to just find a video online – almost any video (within reason) of people rowing will work – and email it to me. Then I can sit down, analyze it, and share what I see. I wish there were gifs like that one I posted in the Bend & Snap post but I haven’t been able to find anything. I got lucky with that one because I just happened to scroll past it on Tumblr while I was procrastinating on writing that post.

I’ll try to write a longer post on this soon but for now, other than what you’ve already said here are five things to watch for with the rower’s blades…

Pausing at any point during the stroke, particularly at the finish (usually leads to rush and check in the boat)

Rowing it in (the legs start before the blade is in the water, resulting in a stroke that’s half or 3/4 as long as it should be)

Excessive amounts of water being thrown up at the finish (this means they’re feathering before their blade is out of the water). It’ll probably look something like this (seriously).

Where the blades are in relation to the water on the recovery (this will tell you what their hands are doing)

Blades “bobbing” while they’re in the water (which means they’re not applying the force evenly and smoothly throughout the drive with the push of their feet and the pull with their hands)