Glossary of Terms: (I will keep adding to this as "Power Ten" progresses)
Launch – A small motorboat used by the coach to follow alongside the shell.
Hands on - A command to grasp the boat by the gunnels in preparation to move it.
Oarlock - The U-shaped metal piece at the end of the rigger that holds the oar in place.
Rigger – The triangular shaped metal device that is bolted onto the side of the boat and holds the oars.
Paddle – To row lightly.
Check it down – A command calling for rowers to drag their oar blades through the water perpendicularly. The blades are squared and partly buried in the water, effectively stopping the boat.
Stern pair – The two rowers at the bow (bow seat and two seat).
Weigh enough – Command for rowers to stop, usually given with a 2-stroke warning. Rowers know that in one (said at the catch), rowers complete one full stroke; and in two (said at the second catch), rowers complete this second full stroke and end at arms away, blades squared, boat balanced.
Skying the blade - Coming to the catch with the blade too high above the surface of the water (kind of like whiffing in baseball).
Washing out/washout - When an oar blade comes out of the water during drive and creates surface wash that causes the shell to lose power and become unsteady.
Even it out – A command that tells the rowers to pull with even pressure on both sides.
Down on port/starboard – Means that the boat is leaning to one side or the other. Rowers on the side that is down must raise their hands, and the other side must lower their hands.
Crab - An unfortunate incident when the blade gets caught in the water and the handle of the oar hits the midsection of the rower; can result in getting tossed out of the boat. It is caused by the blade not entering into the water fully square, when pressure is applied to the blade it will just go deeper and deeper in the water.
Coxswain – Person who steers the shell and is the on-the-water coach for the crew.
Stroke rate – The rate at which all rowers move together, measured by minute.
Catch, Drive, Feather and Recovery – See below.*
Rushing the slide - Bad technique that causes stern check, or rapid deceleration, which comes from coming toward the catch from the recovery too fast.
Power Ten - A call for rowers to do 10 of their best, most powerful strokes. It’s a strategy used to pull ahead of a competitor.
Foot stretchers (stretchers) - Where the rower’s feet go. The stretcher consists of two inclined footrests that hold the rower’s shoes. The rower’s shoes are bolted into the footrests.
Cox box – A microphone system that amplifies the coxswain’s voice so it’s heard throughout the boat. May also have a digital display which tells the coxswain information such as stroke rate, stroke count and time elapsed.
Shell – Racing boats, long, narrow, and broadly semi-circular in cross-section in order to reduce drag to a minimum. They usually have a fin toward the rear, to help prevent roll and going off-course and to increase the effectiveness of the rudder.
Head of the Charles – The largest rowing event in the world, it is a head race held in October on the Charles River in Boston, Mass. Head races are time trial races; boats begin with a rolling start at 10-20 second intervals, are timed over a set distance and vary in length from 2,000 – 12,000 meters.
Ergs/split times – Ergometer or “erg” - A rowing machine that closely approximates the actual rowing motion. The rowers’ choice is the Concept II, which utilizes a flywheel and a digital readout so that the rower can measure “strokes per minute” and the distance covered. Split time refers to the average time it takes to complete 500 m (i.e. the 2000 m time divided by 4).
Vespoli – A brand of racing shell.
Regatta – All races. Those held in the spring and summer and feature side-by-side racing are called regattas; all the boats start at the same time from a stationary position and the winner is the boat that crosses the finish line first.
Tank – An indoor stationary boat immersed in water that many schools use to train new rowers before they are put in real boats. It simulates the action of rowing on the water, but is completely stable.
*The anatomy of a stroke: The two fundamental reference points in the rowing stroke are the catch, immediately prior to the oar blade’s placement in the water, and the extraction (also known as the finish or the release) where the rower removes the oar blade from the water. From the catch, the rower places the blade in the water, then applies pressure to the oar by simultaneously pushing the seat toward the bow of the boat by extending the legs – the drive. As the legs approach full extension, the rower rotates his or her torso toward the bow of the boat and then finally pulls the arms towards his or her chest. The shoulders should not hunch up at any point during the drive. At the very end of the stroke, with the blade still in the water, the hands drop slightly to unload the oar so that spring energy stored in the bend of the oar gets transferred to the boat, which eases removing the oar from the water and minimizes energy wasted on lifting water above the surface (splashing).
The recovery phase follows the drive. It involves removing the oar from the water, and coordinating the body movement to move the oar to the catch. The coordinated body motion that begins at the finish consists of the following: the rower pushes down on the oar handle (or oar handles if the rower is sculling) to quickly lift the blade from the water at the release. Following the release, the rower rapidly rotates the oar to cause the blade of the oar to become parallel to the water (a process referred to as “feathering the blade”) at the same time as pushing the oar handle away from the chest. After feathering and extending the arms, the rower rotates his or her body forward. Once the hands are past the knees, the rower compresses the legs, which moves the seat toward the stern of the boat. The leg compression occurs relatively slowly (compared with the rest of the stroke) which affords the rower a moment to “recover” (hence the term), and allows the boat to glide through the water. Near the end of the recovery, the rower squares the blade (rotates the blade to perpendicular to the water), and then repeats the stroke again, beginning with the catch.
No comments:
Post a Comment