Crescent Boat Club Online Coach
Naming of Parts
Boat
Sweeps and Sculls
Riggers
The Stroke
A single fluid motion. But we can speak about it as if there were distinct parts within the motion.
We’ll start at the finish! Here we are speaking about the position and posture of the rowers body at the point when the oar blades exit the water. Notice legs are extended (flat, straight), the torso is a few degrees past vertical (some tension will be felt as abdominals hold the body up), the shoulders are not scrunched up, the shoulder blades are close to one another across the back, elbows are flared out such that forearm is level and wrists are dropped below level of knuckles. Hands are relaxed and hooked over handles (not tensely gripping handles – ready to push the handles away from the body. The head is straight, level eyes, eyeing the horizon.
Practice Drills
Stop at Hands Away
Instruction: as you row, pause for 3 seconds after you have finished the stroke and pushed your hands, with the oar handles away from your body and toward the stern of the boat.
Purpose: develop a mindset that sees the end of the stroke, not at the finish, but at ‘hands away’ – concentrating on a clean exit of the oars from the water, balanced boat, and the beginning of a recovery whose ratios of execution are such that the hands go quickly to the stern then the body swings less quickly (but not much less) sternward to the torso’s angle of the catch; and then body goes up the slide w diminishing speed as legs compress to achieve the catch.
In the video you will see Mike with good balance in the first two hesitation strokes, but with slow ‘hands away’ (he should be doing this a bit faster). On the third stroke the boat goes off keel as Mike comes up the slide. He then needs to recover balance during the catch of the next stroke. He (intuitively after some years of experience) varies the pressure on the oar blade – putting a bit more pressure on the low side to bring the boat back to level. In a race, this kind of balance recovery action takes away from maximum potential velocity and the acceleration possible at this part of the drive phase. Strive for a recovery that minimizes the loss of any velocity that you’ve just given the boat in the power part of the stroke.
