Tag: rowing

Coxing Novice Q&A Technique

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As a novice coxswain I still really struggle with the technical aspect of practices. This summer I joined a boat club and spent two weeks out on the water learning to row, hoping that the first-hand experience would help me understand how to fix some common problems. Now that I’m coxing again, I still get really confused when something is wrong with the set. I don’t know what other advice to give other than handle height suggestions and counting for catch-timing, especially when it doesn’t seem to be up or down to one side consistently (like rocking back and forth with every stroke). I was wondering what advice you would give to your rowers in a situation like this, and how you can recognize and remedy some common technical problems.

There are a lot of things that can mess with the set and all of them are exacerbated when the rowers you’re coxing are novices. The most common and obvious thing is handle heights and that tends to be what coaches point out the most, so it’s natural for that to be the go-to thing you call for when trying to get the boat to set up.

Calling for catch timing, even though it does cause the boat to go offset, doesn’t do anything to help with the set (at least in my experience) because it takes the focus away from one problem and puts it on another. People start rushing up the slide because they’re behind the count or sitting at the catch and waiting because they’re ahead of it. Any inkling of thought about handle heights goes out the window, which in turn can end up making the set even worse.

When the boat goes off set and I’m coxing, I usually…

Tell the side it’s down to to lift their hands. If that doesn’t work after a stroke or two I’ll tell the other side to lower their hands a bit.

Change how I say “set it up”. If you say “set the boat” too often it’ll start to lose it’s meaning and people will stop listening, so in addition to tell each side what to do I’ll say “stabilize it”, “level it out”, etc.

Remind them to adjust their handle heights only at the finish. Coming out of the turn at the finish is the only spot where their hands should move; too many people try to make adjustments in the middle of the stroke and that ends up throwing the boat way over to the other side (and pissing off the rowers who just had their fingers smashed on the gunnels).

Remind them to shape the finishes by pulling in to their targets and giving themselves room to tap down. So many people either pull into their laps and lift their hands up immediately after the finish or pull in too high and come away at the same height … and then wonder why the boat’s not set.

Make sure their weight is centered in the middle of the boat and that they’re not moving around unnecessarily while they’re sitting out.

Usually I’ll make general calls for technique and the bodies unless I hear the coach point out something specific, in which case I’ll try to focus my calls on that and incorporate the feedback they’re giving into my rotation of calls. For example, if they say something to 3-seat about getting the bodies set early so they’re not rocking over mid-recovery and diving down with the shoulders at the catch (resulting in their blade going up in the air, which leads to a litany of other issues), then I’ll make that (and 3-seat) the focus of my calls for a few strokes until the boat levels out.

As far as recognizing other general technique issues, that comes with experience, paying attention during practice, and hearing/seeing what your coach is pointing out.  If you hear them tell someone they’re washing out, look to that person’s oar and see if you can see it. (If you don’t understand what washing out is, for example, ask.) From there, listen to see what the change is that the coach wants them to make and then watch their blade to see if they actually make that change. See if you can spot the differences between before the change and after. Remember what the boat felt like during the “wrong” strokes so that in the future when the boat feels like that again you can look to see if anyone is washing out and then make the necessary corrections from there.

How To Q&A Rowing

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A problem we always ran into with our boat that we stored down low – when we get the boat out, everybody is on the same side at waist and obviously can’t all bring it up to shoulders. Is there an easier way to do it than having the girls run around to the other side before shoulders or is that just how it is?

That’s kinda just how it is. The easiest way to do it is to have everyone lift it up off the racks at waist, side step to the middle of the boat bay, and then have all the ports or all the starboards go under the boat one by one until everyone is on the correct side. Going under vs. going around just saves time because you don’t have to bob and weave around riggers or other people. From there you can take it up to shoulders and walk it out.

For some reason every so often this confuses the hell out of people and no one knows who should be going under so make sure you specify, “Ports go under, starting from the stern … Annie, go. Maddie, go. Rachel, go. Alex, go.” You want this to be a quick process, obviously, because the boat gets heavier when someone lets go and it’s uncomfortable to hold the boat for too long when everyone is on the same side.

College Video of the Week

Video of the Week: The Social Network

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In honor of the Royal Henley Regatta that takes place later this week, I give you this Armie Hammer appreciation post.

Also, somewhat related, check out these posts by Dan Boyne, coach of Harvard’s recreational rowing program, on the making of the rowing scenes from the movie, including the Henley scene. It didn’t actually hit me until I read this several months ago that the rowing scenes from the beginning are from that stretch between N. Beacon Street and the sandbar (if you’re familiar with the river by CRI). There are nine parts and some are a little lengthy but they’re well worth the read.

Part 1 || Part 2 || Part 3 || Part 4 || Part 5 || Part 6 || Part 7 || Part 8 || Part 9

College Q&A Rowing

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What is Radcliffe? Is that another rowing team? I’ve heard they also row under Harvard’s team?

Radcliffe doesn’t row under Harvard’s team, they are one of Harvard’s teams. They’re the women’s program that rows out of Weld Boathouse, which is on the Cambridge side of the river beside the Anderson bridge.

They’re called “Radcliffe” instead of “Harvard” because in the 1880s (I think) Radcliffe College was established, which was the female counterpart to the men’s Harvard College. Sometime in the mid-70s Harvard’s athletic department took over the Radcliffe athletics program and all the women’s teams took a vote as to whether or not they should become “Harvard” or remain “Radcliffe”. Only women’s rowing decided to not change their name which is why they aren’t known as “Harvard” and still have black and white colors instead of crimson.

Training: Carbohydrate loading and rowing

Rowing Training & Nutrition

Training: Carbohydrate loading and rowing

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In college I majored in sport science and human performance, which meant the bulk of my course load centered on exercise science, sports nutrition, kinesiology, exercise physiology, etc. and nearly all the research I did involved athletes. One of the topics we spent a lot of time covering in my sports nutrition class was the various diets that athletes maintain while in-season, during the off-season, and in the immediate days leading up to competition. Today’s post is going to talk about one of those strategies – carbohydrate loading – and it’s effect on your performance during a race. (Spoiler: there’s not much benefit.)

The role of carbohydrates in the body and during exercise

During high intensity exercise, carbohydrates are the main energy source. CHOs also function as the only fuel for red blood cells, your brain, and nerves. If you deplete your CHO stores, for example during strenuous exercise, your blood glucose will be maintained by breaking down lipids and eventually some protein – lipids are fine but you never want to be breaking down proteins because that means that all other sources of energy have been maxed out so your body now has to rely on its skeletal muscle tissue (which is made up of protein) as a last-ditch energy source. This reverts back to everything I talked about in February regarding eating disorders.

Related: National eating disorder awareness week

During exercise, CHOs are the preferential fuel because they rapidly supply ATP via oxidative processes that allow them to be delivered twice as fast as fat and protein. During anaerobic activity (such as the start and sprint), they are the sole suppliers of ATP. Having a low CHO intake for three consecutive days has been shown to lead to a decrease in anaerobic exercise capacity, which means that if you’re not getting enough carbs in your diet during the week your body will be physically unable to go as hard at the beginning and end of a race, which is why it’s important to make sure you’re eating well-balanced meals all the time (regardless of what weight-class you’re competing in).

CHO-loading as an ergogenic aid

Ergogenic aids are defined as “any method or practice that serves to enhance energy utilization, including energy production, control, and efficiency.” There are several different types of ergogenic aids, some legal (CHO loading), some illegal (blood doping), some mechanical (in the context of rowing, rigging would be an example of this), and some psychological (hypnosis), amongst others.

Related: Intro to rigging

We spent a lot of time talking about the history of ergogenic aids because most people assume that they were developed or thought of recently – in fact, they’ve been in use since the original Olympic games. The ancient Greeks actually believed the “you are what you eat” mantra and to become better competitors, they’d eat the raw meat of lions and tigers because lions and tigers were/are powerful, swift, aggressive, fast, and deadly when on top of their game, which is what we as athletes all strive to be when we compete.

The mechanisms of CHO-loading involve super-compensating the stores of glycogen in the muscles and liver. The pros of doing this include:

Increased time to exhaustion (TTE) in activities lasting longer than 90 minutes and performed at a moderate to high level of intensity (marathons being the main example)

Increased TTE in intermittent high intensity sports (tennis, for example)

Improved endurance by about 20%

Improved performance by about 2-3%

The only major con is that there may be a disturbance in the body’s overall energy balance, meaning that the diet may lack other necessary macronutrients (the other two macronutrients being protein and fat). It’s also been shown that there is little or no effect on high intensity bouts of exercise lasting less than five minutes in length.

Below is a slide I did for a presentation on supplements for a class on issues and controversies in nutrition. We’d just gone over this stuff on ergogenic aids a couple days before this project was assigned so I was able to use all the info from my physiology class for my nutrition class. The yellow, orange, and red table at the top gives you a brief overview of what your CHO intake should look like in the week leading up to a race, which in this case was on a Sunday.

If your diet is made up of about 70% carbohydrates, as you progress through the week (Monday through Thursday) you would gradually decrease the amount of CHOs in your diet. Monday would be 60%, Tuesday 50%, Wednesday 40%, and Thursday 20%. During this time you are still training, although you tend to scale back a little as the week progresses (also known as tapering). On Friday and Saturday you ramp back up the amount of CHOs in your diet (where the term “supercompensate” comes from), from 20% to 75 and 80%.

CHO loading and rowing

Something you might have noticed from that slide and in what I mentioned earlier is that it says “endurance sports” and only talks about the increased TTE in events lasting longer than 90 minutes. So, this would lead one to believe that CHO loading before a sprint race wouldn’t do much to enhance your performance, which for the most part would be correct. CHO loading is better suited for something like a head race where you’re going at 100% for 20-30 minutes, although even then any performance benefits would be small.

Pre-competition meals

To ensure your energy supplies are topped off before an event, your best bet is to eat a pre-competition meal about three hours ahead of time, although it’s important to remember that this meal alone cannot and will not make up for having a poor chronic diet. Ideally you’d be eating something with 150-300g of carbs (3-5g/kg of body weight) while being sure to avoid anything containing high fat or protein contents. The advantages of  a meal like this are that they replenish your glycogen stores, it requires less energy to break down, nutrients are absorbed faster, digestion is quick, and it serves as the main source of energy for short term anaerobic/high intensity aerobic exercise, which is basically exactly what a sprint race is.

On the flip side, if you eat something immediately before you go out and race, you end up with a spike in your blood glucose levels which results in a hyper-insulinemic response. Because of the surge in insulin being released, your blood glucose then plummets which in turn leads to your performance being not so great. This is why you should avoid eating anything within thirty minutes of your race.

So, what should you actually eat?

There are so many options. Seriously. Pasta is not the only food with carbohydrates – bagels, peanut butter, honey, raisins, whole-wheat bread, apples, brown rice, yogurt, sweet potatoes, etc. are all examples of good staples in a rower’s diet.

If you’re going to commit to CHO loading, you should spend the time to work out exactly how many grams of carbs you should be eating/how much you need and then determine the number of carbs/calories in the foods you’re ingesting. If you’re in college and are taking a nutrition class or know someone who is, ask to borrow whatever book they’re using. Most basic nutrition classes require textbooks that tend to have long, long, long lists of foods in the back from every food group that list amount of macronutrients they contain. If you can’t do that, you can search whatever food you’re trying to look up and the awesomeness of Google will tell you right on the search page the number of carbs that food contains. If you don’t trust Google, I suggest using the USDA’s website. All you have to do is open up the “carbohydrates” report – you can open it with the foods listed either alphabetically or by nutrient content, which has the foods with the highest amount of carbs listed first.

Vegetarians, vegans, and CHO loading

There’s a lot of controversy on athletes who are vegetarians or vegans since the majority of them don’t eat any animal by-products, which cuts out a lot of the foods that their carnivorous counterparts rely on to maintain adequate energy stores. When attempting to CHO load, the options are pretty much the same for the most part, the only difference being they would need to look into gluten-free options and replace the meat and dairy with more vegetables, lentils, beans, tofu, chickpeas, etc. If there are any vegetarian/vegan rowers out there who wouldn’t mind sharing the foods they eat when prepping for a race, that’d be great.

Moral of the story…

Carbo-loading for sprint races is pretty much pointless. It’s a little more understandable for head races but in essence this is a tactic best reserved for straight endurance athletes, which rowers are not. You’re better off eating a diet rich in protein (see the slide below this) than trying to ingest large amounts of carbs that you most likely won’t fully burn off.

That isn’t to say that you shouldn’t be eating a solid amount of carbs too, because obviously you should be, but when comparing the benefits of CHO loading (remember, that’s super-compensating the amount of carbs you’re taking in) vs. ingesting protein, the more applicable benefits to rowing come from diets with adequate amounts of protein in them.

Image via // @row_360

College Ergs Q&A Recruiting Rowing

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Hey so following that junior girl, I’m going into junior year as well, I’m 5’9″ and on the lower side of lightweight. I pull an 8:00 2k, and I know that’s not low enough but do you think I may have a chance at recruitment? There’s only so many lightweight options and I’m not at that level, so I need a compromise. Tips for really getting that time down in the next year?

D1 programs tend to look for 2ks around 7:40-7:45ish as a starting point. As a junior, you’ve definitely got time to shave some seconds off your current 2k, it’s just going to be a matter of putting in the meters to get it done – basically it comes down to steady state, steady state, and more steady state. Build up your strength and endurance too – try to incorporate some lifting into your routine over the summer, as well as some cardio (running, biking, or swimming are great options).

I’m not sure if this is a misconception or just something that people don’t know but you don’t have to be recruited to row on the team in college. You could just email the coach up and say “hey, I was accepted into the Class of 2017, I rowed for four years in high school, and I’m interested in walking on to the team.” If you’re not sure your times are good enough to be recruited or after talking to coaches you don’t get any offers, you should consider this route.

To be honest, if you’re on the low side of lightweight (I’m assuming around 115-120lbs?) you’ll probably get more requests to cox rather than row, even though you’re tall. Height isn’t as much a big deal for coxswains as weight is, so even though the majority of us are vertically challenged there have been known to be a few tall coxswains. Your height is great for a rower but being 20+ pounds lighter than the other openweights can make it hard for you to actually be competitive with them, which is probably what coaches will point out.

Novice Q&A Rowing

Question of the Day

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So I’ve been rowing for a year and a lot of people underestimate me because I’m young and short but I’ve been doing a lot better than people taller and those who’ve been there longer than me. The problem is the coaches look over me (I’m 5’5″) and automatically chose this girl for boats who’s a bit taller than me, even though my times are better and I’m a better rower. How do I get them to look at us equally?

Ask for a seat race. State your case as to why you think you deserve to be in whichever boat you’re going for and why you think you’re the best choice. What can you bring to the boat that will make it go fast? The key to getting your coach(es) to take you seriously is to talk yourself up instead of talking the other person down. Seat races, when done correctly, can be a really good indication as to who can move boats, so I think asking for one of them will be your best bet. Whatever the final decision though, you’ve got to respect it. Talk to your coaches one-on-one and and tell them that you feel like you’re progressing well with your rowing and really want to be considered as a contender for the top boats – what, in their opinion, should you work on so you can be considered for those lineups?

Assuming you’re only a freshman or sophomore, you are going to grow more (do as I say, not as I do – pretty sure I stopped growing in like, 8th grade). 5’5″ isn’t that short – the majority of junior women I know who row now, in addition to the girls I rowed with in high school, are all in the 5’5″ to 5’7″ range. Even if that is the reason your coaches aren’t boating you, don’t use it as a crutch. A rower’s height is only part of what makes them an efficient rower. Do everything you can to improve the other parts so that when your coaches look at you, they think about your technique, how coachable you are, what kind of teammate you are, etc. before the thought of your height even crosses their mind.

Q&A Rowing Teammates & Coaches

Question of the Day

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Next weekend is the last race of the season. I’ve been stroke all year, but for this last race I’m suddenly put in bow seat. I can row both sides that’s not an issue, I just sort of feel useless because I don’t have the same responsibilities anymore. I really want to ask my coach about it, but I don’t want to sound ungrateful or cocky. How should I approach this?

If you want to ask your coach about it just be straightforward and to the point. As long as you aren’t whiny or accusatory, there’s really no way that you can look bad. Just say that you’re curious why the lineup was changed for the last race, if this is indicative of something you need to work on, etc. and listen to what they have to say.

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

Without knowing your coach’s motives, here’s my take. As the stroke, you had one job – set and maintain the pace for the crew. Because strokes tend to spend so much time thinking about this their technique can start to falter, which is why sometimes coaches will throw them back in 6-seat for a practice or two to relieve them of the pressures of stroking and let them re-focus on their own rowing and technique. In bow seat your technique needs to be solid because you have a much more profound impact on the set because the boat is narrower there vs. in the middle of the boat or in the stern. So, if you’re moving from a position where you could theoretically get away with having okay technique to the spot in the boat that requires some of the best technique, that’s a sign that your coach is confident that you can contribute from any seat in the boat. I wouldn’t be too upset about that since that’s a good thing.

Plus, the whole point of the sport is that no one rower contributes more than another so regardless of what seat you’re in, you’re not useless just because you’re not the stroke.

High School Q&A

Question of the Day

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My parents are guilting me about the cost of my summer rowing program, despite it being far cheaper than any camp my brother has ever done (sorry personal rant point right there haha). I feel bad about doing it but mad at my parents for giving me crap about it as well. We’re going to Club Nats and Canadian Henley and I was SO excited for it but not so much anymore, even though this is really important to me. How do I get my parents to see that this is worth it?

I totally get what you’re saying. Being really excited about something and then having someone be negative towards it or you is so frustrating. I understand why the money thing can be an issue too but it’s definitely not something worth being guilt-tripped over, especially if you’ve shown a serious interest and commitment towards rowing and isn’t something you’re just going to give up in a year.

Why did they think the camps were worth it for your brother? Explain to them how those reasons apply to you too. If you’re looking at rowing or coxing in college, explain to them why participating in a summer program, as well as being competitive at Club Nationals and Canadian Henley, can help you stand out with college coaches. Above all else, it shows commitment and dedication, two things coaches at any level appreciate. If paying for it is a real issue, offer to help cover part of the costs. If you can’t pay for it upfront, offer to pay them back 1/4 of the cost (or whatever you both decide is reasonable) at the end of the summer after you’ve had time to make some money.

Related: Can you explain Canadian Henley to me? People keep telling me it’s a national team thing.

Why do you want to do it? Why is it important to you? Why is racing over the summer something you want to do? What are you goals/what do you hope to accomplish? How is this summer program, the coaches, etc. going to help you achieve them? Saying that you just really love rowing and traveling to the regattas will be fun isn’t going to cut it in this case. You can tell them that but you’ve also got to tell them about how improving your technique is a goal so that right off the bat in the fall you can be in the mix of people being considered for the “A” boat that’s going to Head of the Charles. Make sense?

Maybe your parents just aren’t sure of your reasons for wanting to do it, which is why they’re apprehensive about paying all this money. Hopefully it’s not their intentions to be buzzkills but it’s possible they’ll change their tune once you talk to them and make it clear what your intentions are.