Almost Game Time
Our first regatta of the spring season is coming up next weekend. We've got 5 water days left before our de-rigging then travel days. We're heading up to the Green Lake Sprints, a regatta held oddly enough in Green Lake Washington just north and barely west of Seattle.
For the last two weeks we've been working on basic technical work making sure that the new guys are catching up with the returners and working the kinks out of the returners to make sure we can pick up right where we left off in the fall.
Overall things look fairly good. The boat is running set and the oar handles are about where I want them. Next week when we're working in our racing lineups I'll make sure the rigger spacers are set where I want them - currently I have the boat completely "neutral." We're still working on feathering and starts but we are no where near spring speed yet. It's a lesson that I learned from Ted while at Pacific Rowing Club. That spring despite having a large varsity crew that was in very good shape, we had a very deliberate build up, building the boats and the speed. We were competitive but we'd endured a few losses. The idea was that we wanted to be peaking when it mattered the most and Ted wanted to do well at Regionals.
This is the same philosophy that I've been working with and I like it. We're not a big group of guys to begin with so the more technically clean we can row the better we can apply our power. The power built up over winter is something that I feel we can tap later when we need it but for now I want to make sure that we're taking solid strokes.
All of that is basically saying that I'm keep very realistic expectations for next weekend. I see it as a good warm up for spring that will tell me how the guys are doing but not necessarily telling me who is better/worse in our region. I've told the guys that we are training up till Brentwood which is the first regatta where I start to care about placing and speed.
I know that some coaches would disagree with this sort of training and tell you that each and every race is important and part of me agrees. I would like an undefeated season; I've been close twice, but I'm a bigger fan of earning a medal when it matters the most and until I learn something new, that's how I'm going to go about it.
For the last two weeks we've been working on basic technical work making sure that the new guys are catching up with the returners and working the kinks out of the returners to make sure we can pick up right where we left off in the fall.
Overall things look fairly good. The boat is running set and the oar handles are about where I want them. Next week when we're working in our racing lineups I'll make sure the rigger spacers are set where I want them - currently I have the boat completely "neutral." We're still working on feathering and starts but we are no where near spring speed yet. It's a lesson that I learned from Ted while at Pacific Rowing Club. That spring despite having a large varsity crew that was in very good shape, we had a very deliberate build up, building the boats and the speed. We were competitive but we'd endured a few losses. The idea was that we wanted to be peaking when it mattered the most and Ted wanted to do well at Regionals.
This is the same philosophy that I've been working with and I like it. We're not a big group of guys to begin with so the more technically clean we can row the better we can apply our power. The power built up over winter is something that I feel we can tap later when we need it but for now I want to make sure that we're taking solid strokes.
All of that is basically saying that I'm keep very realistic expectations for next weekend. I see it as a good warm up for spring that will tell me how the guys are doing but not necessarily telling me who is better/worse in our region. I've told the guys that we are training up till Brentwood which is the first regatta where I start to care about placing and speed.
I know that some coaches would disagree with this sort of training and tell you that each and every race is important and part of me agrees. I would like an undefeated season; I've been close twice, but I'm a bigger fan of earning a medal when it matters the most and until I learn something new, that's how I'm going to go about it.
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