Tag: racing

Coxing Q&A Racing

Question of the Day

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How should a coxswain deal with pre-race doubts and jitters?

I think you should always be a little nervous before you race. I get nervous going to the starting line but that’s mostly because I try to micromanage everything (not really the best course of action, to be honest…). Granted, being in control of your nerves and not being that person that is a blithering idiot about everything is fairly crucial too. If you’re doubting something before your race, whether it’s your skills as a coxswain or your crew’s ability to have a good race, you didn’t prepare enough, plain and simple.

Related: Once we are underway with an outing or actually in a race, I am completely in control and able to respond to any situation and keep a level head, which is what I think makes me a good cox. I find it difficult to keep that same composure on land or as we navigate up to the start. I panic and stress that we are missing a rower/ late/ something has gone wrong. I find it difficult to not get irate with my crew and my coach tells me to stop stressing but I don’t know how. Help?

Using your time wisely and effectively during practice and practicing the things you need to work on will ensure that on race day you’re adequately prepared to do what you’re there to do. I mean, that’s the entire reason why we practice, right? If you come back from a race knowing you were really nervous going to the start, figure out why. Is it just general nerves or is it because you didn’t have a race plan, were running late, etc.? Once you’ve figured out the root cause, determine how you’re going to do it differently next time. That could be actually coming up with a race plan, getting the crew together 30 minutes sooner than last time so you can launch earlier and not be rushed to the line, etc.

If you’re nervous and it’s just the normal kind of nerves, relax, close your eyes, and take a deep breath or two. (This is commonly called “centering yourself” in the sport psych world.) Outside of trying to micromanage things, I’d say that most of my nerves are nothing more than an adrenaline rush. That helps me out a lot at the start though because once the flag drops, the nerves go away and the adrenaline takes over, which means I’ve got a lot of energy to put into the beginning of the race.

Another thing that helps that a lot of athletes do, particularly pro-athletes, is visualization. If you’ve been watching the Olympics you’ve probably heard at least one athlete from every sport say the spent the previous night or the morning of their competition visualizing their routine or their race. It’s exactly what it sounds like too – you’re visualizing yourself going through every step of your event, from launching to your warm up to back into the starting platform to every part of your race plan. Visualizing how everything is supposed to go helps you build a bit of confidence which ultimately leads to your nerves either being eliminated or at the very least, better controlled.

Coxswain recordings, pt. 17

College Coxing Racing Recordings

Coxswain recordings, pt. 17

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Dartmouth University 2011 Eastern Sprints Lightweight 8+ Heat

One early takeaway from this recording is how quickly and seamlessly he gives their position on the crews around there – “half a length up on Cornell, holding our margin on Princeton”. The easiest way to make communicating that information to your crew as effortless as he did is to know who’s in your race (duh/obviously) but if you’re a novice coxswain who isn’t used to racing six crews across, a simple hack is to write the crews (in lane # order) on a piece of electrical tape (with a Sharpie) and tape it above your foot.

Around 4:20ish you can see that Princeton’s already taken the rate up and Dartmouth … hasn’t. Their coxswain called that lengthen 10 and then the “big focus 5” (personally I think those should have been switched) and seemed to completely miss Princeton taking it up until they were already a few strokes into their sprint and had started to full even. They still won the heat and obviously that’s the most important thing but you’ve gotta make sure that you’re not so focused on calling moves that you forget to look at what’s happening around you, especially in the last 500 (or 300, in this case).

Other calls I liked:

“That’s it Dartmouth…”

“Grip and breathe…“

“Keep your focus internal, they’re not taking seats any time soon.”

Dartmouth University 2011 Eastern Sprints Lightweight 8+ Grand Final

Following the previous recording, this is the grand final from Sunday afternoon.

His intensity is great and like all good coxswains, it’s not about what he says but how he says it. His calls are sharp and concise and the tonal changes in his voice really emphasize what he wants his crew to do. That is the ultimate takeaway from this recording. He also tells them exactly where they are on the other big players in the race, as well as how far into the race they are time-wise. As they’re walking through Yale during the sprint you can feel the energy he’s bringing through his calls and that’s what you want at the end of the race – gun to your head, if you’ve gotta pick one spot in the race to pour your energy into, it’s right there in the last 500.

At 1:30 they’re through the 500 and practically four boats across when you hear him say “swing it and go, pry those puddles, take one seat…”. Take one seat. This is a great move because it’s a small, achievable goal for the crew and when the crews are that tight, walking up or back one seat on the field can be a huge difference maker.

Other calls I liked:

“There’s blood in the water, you’re hungry for this win…”

“Stomp on them, go…“

You can find and listen to more recordings by checking out the “Coxswain Recordings” page.

Coxing Q&A Racing

Question of the Day

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Hi, so I’m coxing a race this weekend and its a bit of a funny course. Its raced 2 X 1800m stints so I am unsure how to cox it? As two separate pieces? Or as the full 3.6k? How tired should they be at the mid point, as they get a good few mins rest?? I am also racing the course later in a crew so it would be interesting to know your take on racing such an odd head. Sorry for all the questions, Thanks a lot! 🙂

Personally, I think I would try to cox it as a combination of a head race and a sprint, with the starts being head-race style and the bodies being sprint race style … ish.

A few things, first…

I’m assuming this is set up more like a head race course and less like a sprint race course. I’m also assuming that in between each 1800m you’ll want/have to keep the crew moving (meaning no one completely weighs enough). If you do get to weigh enough, pretty much everything I said in orange doesn’t apply (except for the park about making sure they all drink something).

Break the two pieces up like you would a head race – the first third is all about technique, pace, and rhythm, the second third is starting to incorporate in some motivational calls (sparingly), and the final third is mostly motivation while still keeping them on pace. With this race, your middle third is going to be the end of one piece and the beginning of another so you’ll probably end up doing calls that center around “clean strokes, finish out the first piece strong” and “let’s re-establish that rhythm we had in the first piece, *compliment them on something that felt really good that you want to carry over to the 2nd piece*”.

Make sure you and your crews stretch before you go out, drink plenty of fluids, and eat something small within 30min of your race. Also, don’t forget to go over your race plan one final time with them before you launch. Keep the warmup conservative but if you have room and time to spare, try to get at least one good practice start in at at least 3/4ish pressure. Don’t take too many hard strokes though, you don’t want to tire them out before you even get to the starting line.

You’re right, this is a really odd race but I think the key to racing it successfully is having a coxswain who knows how to pace his or her crew. The rowers also need to know how to pace themselves but I think it’s a lot easier to do that when you’ve got one person saying “this is when we’re gonna go hard, this is when we’re gonna stay relaxed, in 50m we’re gonna hit it, etc.” If you’ve got eight people that are rowing as eight people instead of one crew, you’re not going to be able to pace yourself and you’re going to burn out really fast.

I would say how tired they are probably depends a lot on their individual fitness and stamina but if I had to make a really rough guess, I’d say if they were working hard and you paced them properly they should probably feel like they just did a 2k at about 85-88%, give or take. They should be tired and feeling it but not so tired that they can’t do it again after 3-5 minutes.

Coxing How To Q&A Racing

Question of the Day

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Hi! In a race, when you call a power 10, do you call it two strokes ahead (Power 10 in two, that’s one, two,) or do you just call it?

I say it’s up to you, what you’re comfortable with, and what you see. With younger, less experienced crews you almost always call it in two because they need that “warning”/prep period a little more than an advanced or elite level crew would but as you start working with advanced high school crews, college crews, etc. you can almost always call it “on this one” if you choose to.

I tend to go back and forth with how I call it. If I can see another crew making a move or we’re running out of water to make our move, regain seats, walk away, etc. then I’ll say “on this one” because I don’t feel like I can afford to waste those two strokes where you’d normally say “one, two”. If we’re in a good position and I want to keep building on that then I’ll say “in two” or something similar because I think that it helps to maintain the pace that is (hopefully) already working for you and it doesn’t give that sense of immediate urgency that “on this one” does.

Coxing Q&A Racing

Question of the Day

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Any tips on being clear and concise with calls during race pieces? I tend to get a little overwhelmed by everything going on around me and I sometimes trip over words or get too wordy.

Tripping over words is gonna happen. It’s just one of those things that you can’t get defeated by, especially if you’re just starting out as a coxswain. Out of all the recordings I’ve listened to I’d say probably three of every five have some kind of flub in them. It’s not that big of a deal though and most of the time if it’s just a quick stumble the rowers won’t notice it, especially if it’s during a race. If it becomes a frequent thing and it’s causing you to get flustered and lose your focus, then it’ll start becoming a distraction to the rowers, which you don’t want.

The times I have the most issues with this is when it gets really cold outside and my face is so cold that my lips are numb. Numb = not moving very quickly = my brain is stringing together calls faster than my mouth can spit them out. Most of the time I just stop, shake it off (I literally shake my head), refocus, and pick up where I left off. All that happens in about a split second so it’s not like you’re taking five strokes to recover. Acknowledge that you slipped up but remember that at the end of the race, you’re most likely going to be the only one that remembers and/or cares.

One thing that can help with being too wordy is to plan out your calls ahead of time. I don’t plan out my races word for word but I at least have a general idea, based on previous races, practice that week, and talking with the crew, of what I want/need to say. You can make it easier on yourself too by putting a post-it note near your cox box with a list of calls on it so that you can see the calls that you need to start incorporating into your vocabulary. That way on race day you’ll already have them in your brain and won’t have to worry so much about getting tripped up over trying to come up with things to say. It also helps you avoid being too wordy because you know these are the calls you need to make at some point based on everything I already mentioned, meaning the rest of the time should be filled with anything you see about their blades right now (as a crew or individually), where you are location-wise, where the other crews are, etc.

Related: HOCR: Race plan “hacks”

Before you work on your calls though you need to figure out what’s overwhelming you about races. Is it just because you’re not the only boat out there or because everything’s happening so quickly or …? As soon as you determine why you’re getting overwhelmed then you can take the necessary steps to work on that during practice so that in future situations you don’t feel that way. If it’s because of the other boats being around you, put yourself in between two other crews while you’re doing warmups or something and don’t pay attention to them. Keep an eye on the distance between the blades so there aren’t any clashes but other than that, pretend like they aren’t there. Focus on your crew, their technique, and what they’re doing.

Since you’ll likely need to look at another crew during a race to see their position, practice doing this by pacing yourself throughout your row – try doing it every 5 strokes to start. All you’re doing is giving them a quick glance too. The longer you look at them the greater the chance that you’ll get distracted. Everything that’s going on around you should be secondary to what’s happening in front of you. Keeping the focus on what your crew is doing and not getting distracted by the other crews around you is a matter of discipline, plain and simple.

Coxswain recordings, pt. 16

College Coxing Racing Recordings

Coxswain recordings, pt. 16

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Sacramento State Start Lake Natoma Invite

This is a short clip that gives a good example of how to call a start. I’m not a huge advocate of counting down the strokes unless it’s two or three strokes leading into a move or stride (i.e. “let’s shift in three … in two …  in one, now…”) but that’s beside the point in this particular recording. The takeaway here is her tone and how she delivers her calls – sharp, quick, and concise.

Bucknell Men’s Novice 8+ Grand Final ECAC New England Championships

https://www.youtube.com/watch?NR=1&feature=endscreen&v=d14Y4JzmsRM

Overall this is a good recording for a freshman/novice race. He starts off the first 500 by spending a lot of time noting their position on the other crews, which on one hand is good that he’s giving his boat that information but there’s definitely a better way to present it. You don’t want to put all your energy into talking about the rest of the field because that takes the focus away from your boat, which is the number one priority. You want to make sure you’re throwing down a clear, established rhythm right as you settle to your base pace and then once you’ve got the boat running and swinging well, that’s when you can start shifting your focus to how the race is evolving around you.

At 1:25 when he’s building into their upcoming move, it feels super frantic when he yells “get the bow ball ahead”. I get what he’s going for but I think this could have been executed a little cleaner. The subsequent calls though are good.

As the race goes on, he’s doing a great job of telling the crew where they’re at on the rest of the field … which I know is contrary to what I said earlier but the difference is that now is actually the appropriate time to be making all those calls. You hear him talk about how close they are to Michigan and Ithaca right before and right after they cross the thousand – that would have been the opportunity to shut them down with a move. When you’ve got crews that are half a seat or one seat off of you, you’ve gotta shift your priorities from whatever you’re currently doing to putting them in your rearview mirror for good. You don’t want to be on the losing end of that seat race once the other crew finally decides they’re sick of you guys sitting on each other.

Last thing to point out – look at the courses of each of the coxswains as they’re coming down the course. Trinity was swerving a bit in the last 250m or so, which probably/definitely cost them a seat or two. You can see Bucknell and BC doing the same around 5:00 and in the last 10-15 strokes, respectively.

Other calls I liked:

“Our race to win…”

You can find and listen to more recordings by checking out the “Coxswain Recordings” page.

College Quotes Racing Rowing Training & Nutrition Video of the Week

Video of the Week: Yale Men’s 8+ at the 1956 Melbourne Olympics

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Wouldn’t it be cool if collegiate crews still represented the USA at international regattas like this? This video talks about Yale’s eight that competed in Melbourne and the tough competition they faced, mainly in the Australian crew, on their way to winning the gold medal over 2nd place Canada and 3rd place Australia.

There were a couple things I took from this video but the biggest one is what is said at 6:20 – “he has the phenomenal ability to pace himself so that the last stroke he has to row is the last stroke he can row”. Ponder that thought the next time you’re on the water or on the erg. Condition your body so that the last stroke you have to row is the last stroke you can row.

Coxswain recordings, pt. 15

College Coxing Racing Recordings

Coxswain recordings, pt. 15

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Cal Berkeley 2001 Pac 10 Championships

I tend to think that likening coxswains to jockeys is kind of a lazy (and not totally representative) comparison but this is the first recording I’ve listened to where the visual I have in my head is of the coxswain just whipping his racehorse(s) the whole way down the course to make sure their nose is in front at the end. I know this in your face, brute-ish style of coxing isn’t for everyone but I love it. His style is very crisp, powerful, and determined – you can hear that when he’s talking to the individuals in the boat (which he does frequently) and when he’s making calls for “the Bears”.

Information-wise, you hear him give consistent updates on the time and splits, in addition to the specific time when he’s going to call their next move. I hadn’t heard that before listening to this recording and thought it was an interesting strategy – it’s basically just a different (better?) way of saying “in two”.

The other thing I liked was his tone in the lead-up to their moves. 2:20 is a good example of this. He’s very measured in his tone, the calls are simple, and then at 2:28 you can almost feel the surge in power when he says “NOW!“.

Other calls I liked:

“Quick and light…”

“Sit up tall, breathe deep…”

“Bears are gonna move…”

“5 more, break ’em…”

“Coming into the last 15, this one’s gonna hurt ’em, kill ’em now…“

Ohio State University Women’s 2V8+ and V8+ 2013 NCAA Championships

There’s not a ton of audio to listen to in this video (it contains clips from the 2V8+ and Varsity 8+ races) but one thing I wanted to point out is the clip at 2:41 when she says “Ohio State Buckeyes are out in the lead! We are out … in … the lead.”. It’s a super simple call but the way she says it is confident as fuck. I also like the call at 3:18 – “they’re making moves back, they will get nothing out of us…”.

You can find and listen to more recordings by checking out the “Coxswain Recordings” page.

Coxswain Recordings, pt. 14

College Coxing Racing Recordings

Coxswain Recordings, pt. 14

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Three Rivers Rowing Association 2013 Head of the Ohio Women’s Varsity 8+

Something that I’ve talked about before and talk about a lot with the coxswains I’m coaching is knowing when to call things in three, in two, “on this one”, etc. At 1:47 where she wants to increase the pressure she calls for them to do it “in two”. Now granted, during a head race you’ve got plenty of room to execute your moves and you don’t have to worry quite so much about running out of space like you do during a 2k but some things, like calling for an increase in pressure, don’t need that “prep period” that those two strokes give you. Instead it should be an immediate thing where the coxswain says “let’s increase the power with the legs, on this one … leeeegs chaaa … leeeegs chaaa” … or something like that.

Also, make sure you’re giving your crews regular updates as to your position on other crews (especially if you’re making a lot of calls about pushing them back, walking away, etc.), how far into the race you are (either distance-wise, if you know and/or time-wise since you have a timer on your cox box that you should have started at the beginning of the piece), etc. We just did evaluations with our coxswains last week and this was one of the most commonly made “requests” by the rowers so just keep in mind that little things like this are important for them to hear throughout the race and it requires absolutely no effort on your part to give them that. 

Ultimately I liked her intensity and general tone throughout the piece but she was way too wordy and said a lot without saying anything at all. There weren’t many calls of substance and she got repetitive with a lot of them as the piece went on, in addition to like I said before, not giving any updates with regards to their position on other crews or the course.

University of Texas 2013 Conference USA 1N8+ Grand Final

The race starts at 4:00. Overall this is a solid piece. She does a good job executing the race plan, telling the crew where they’re at on the rest of the field, and maintaining her focus and energy throughout the race. She’s a little aggressive with the rhythmic coxing (in the sense that I feel like she’s really overdoing it), which prevented her calls from having a good flow to them, which I tend to think is a lot more effective in helping to establish/maintain rhythm.

I liked how at 9:08 she said “we’re gonna win this if you do what I tell you”, which is a pretty ballsy call that I think would really only work if your crew had complete and total trust in you as their coxswain.

Other calls I liked:

“We’re at the thousand, new race, sit the fuck up, get your blades the fuck in, and we’re going now…“

You can find and listen to more recordings by checking out the “Coxswain Recordings” page.