If you want a certain thing,
You must first become a certain person.
When you are that person
You will no longer want that thing.
Zen koan (adapted)
Clearly, we’re going to talk about how to row in rough water. I know you knew that – just from the title alone you guessed it, and the koan was just for flourish.
I clearly remember the day I learned to row in chop. It was actually during my second-to-last year of serious competition in my single, and it came after years of training in the basin of the Charles River with my friend Rudy, because Rudy has a Filippi and he hated having to steer upstream during pieces (I’m not bitter. I’m not bitter). I have a van Dusen from 1984, which is no trouble at all to steer, but is, I believe, physically impossible to set. But I needed somebody to do the pieces with, and Rudy was on the same workout plan, so into the basin we trooped. Despite all those pieces in the basin, I didn’t actually learn how to row well in chop until Canadian Henley one year.
I was actually watching the 1000m masters races, and the racecourse was in the throes of a fearsome tailwind. We were all lucky it was a tail instead of a head, but it was still almost unrowable. I was absently watching heat after heat of masters struggle in the waves, trying not to be nervous for when my 2000m races would come around. I noticed something very interesting. Some of the people looked like I felt: They would hit a wave with one oar, rocket over to list on the other side of their boats, struggle to take a few clean strokes, and repeat the same process – over and over and over again. The people who were making progress looked like they were just getting their blades up and over the tips of the waves….
Right! Getting their blades up over the waves! By getting their handles down lower!
My college coach’s words came back to me like one of those echoing flashbacks in Seinfeld: Mayrene’s voice saying, “Get your handles down a little lower! lower! lower…”
I felt liberated and stupid, all at the same time. But I did better in my race than I had in any other piece in chop I ever had before.
So that’s one important technique you can use (yes! you too!) to row in chop. The wrinkle is, or course, that you have to have the trust in your own balance to keep your blades farther off the water than usual. In chop, actually, this is a win, even if you don’t think you have good balance. That’s because if your oars are close to the water you suffer mightily, as you probably know from bitter experience. But if your oars are above most of the waves, you suffer less.
Another useful trick for rowing in chop is to keep your arms and shoulders very relaxed. This is a process, not an outcome; you’ll discover yourself getting tight after a couple of strokes, and have to take a deep breath to relax. That’ll last until the next wave goes over your gunwales and hits you in the kidneys, and then you’ll have to start all over again. That’s okay. You’ll get used to re-relaxing yourself stroke by stroke, and then it will look from the outside like you’re just staying relaxed.
The reason you need to keep your upper body relaxed is so that you don’t transfer the force of whacking into a wave to your hull. Remember when we were talking about your core, and how it wants to be nice and firm so that it transfers all the force you generate with your legs to the blades? Same thing, only in reverse, for the arms and the hull of the boat. You’ll feel more tippy if your hull rocks than if your oars just wave around in the air. And if you’re stiff with your upper body, any impact between the blade and the water will be more efficiently transferred to the hull. But if your upper body is more relaxed, then it will absorb more of the shock, and that’s to your advantage.
If the water is scary-choppy, just row three-quarter slide or even half-slide. My husband once did that during one of his “three hour tours” (sing that to the tune of the theme of "Gilligan’s Island"). It was in Clemson, South Carolina, U.S.A., and he rowed out on the lake they have there for an afternoon jaunt. He’s been rowing since he was in high school, and loves exploring. But it got windy during the row, and his trip really did turn into a three-hour tour. I think he had to row back arms-and-body only. (Of course, he’s still faster at arms-and-body than I am at full slide, but that’s because he really has freakishly long limbs).
Basically, if you’re too nervous about the water you find yourself in to row normally, then just stay in the middle of the stroke – you can avoid getting all the way up to the catch by rowing three-quarter slide, and you can take your blades out before your hands get to your shirt so you don’t get stuck. Remember that you’ll have to have some larger-amplitude movements in chop. That is, you won’t be able to cheat like you do in flat water and feather the blades out, because you stand a good chance of slicing your blades through a wave and getting stuck. You’ll have to extract more of the blade before feathering. And if you’re listing to one side or the other, you’ll have to hinge from the shoulders farther to get both blades in the water.
In my recent poring through American Rowing articles from yesteryear, I found one by Shirwin Smith, who used to be the director of the Open Water Rowing Center in Sausalito, CA. Her advice is sage, and not just for rowing in choppy water.
She advocates the opposite of feeling like your handles are on a tabletop. The tabletop idea is fine when the water is as flat as a tabletop, but when the surface of the water is dynamic, so must your handle height be. “Instead of thinking your way through rough water,” she says, “feel your way through it.” You can’t assume that the motion you make at the catch will be just this big every single stroke, because in rough water it won’t be. Sometimes you’ll be squaring up right at the water, sometimes you’ll be what feels like a foot off the water as you square. And sometimes you’ll be both – one with each oar. Especially at the catch you may feel like the handles are far apart in height. But put your mind into your blades and sense them like you were taking handholds of water, and then pry yourself past those handholds.
Even during the drive you’ll fare better if your hands and shoulders are relaxed (but not limp). If you rock into a trough and your shoulders are stiff, you’ll be more likely to wash out and take an air stroke on one side. But if you’re more relaxed and like a stiff bungee, then your blades will stay buried. You’ll have to be sensitive to where the water is and adjust to it.
The basic idea to take away is that the water determines where the blades are, the blades determine where the handles are, and the handles determine where your hands and shoulders will be. Realize the essential randomness of life, and just go with it.
On the recovery you can still use level hands (though also low hands) to return the hull to its balance point. Make sure to brush the knuckles of your right hand to the heel of your left hand so that you won’t meet up with your fingernails and so that you find that level point. If that doesn’t do the trick, think about pressing slightly with the heel in the higher side to return your hull to level.
With all of these tricks, perhaps the most important one is just to stop caring about the chop. You’ll hit waves. You’ll get wet. Your oars will get taken by the wind and your hull will rock around. But it’s just not that big a deal.
If you want to row in chop as well as you do in flat water, you first have to become the sort of person who doesn’t care about rowing in chop. And when you have become that person, you may stop wanting to row in flat water and discover the joys of open-water rowing.