How to keep good catches when rowing at race pace
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Getting a good catch in training is relatively easy, but a good catch can be elusive when racing.
In this video, Ken describes and demonstrates a drill he's found helpful in helping crews maintain their good catches when it comes to racing. |
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Video Transcript
Lets do a variant on that catch drill and do a bit of fast stuff to try and get into that same catch mode with the racing mentality so we want to have a high rating piece of about 10 strokes and then a low rating piece of 10 strokes and what i want you to do is just before you come into the high rating piece I want you to focus on the last couple of strokes of the slow rating piece to to make sure catches in shins are vertical catches in i'm in a long way and i've got my hands a long way up so that again it's getting that mindset buried in as deeply as we can before you do the race can we try that because it's really about like three two one then we go back on again yeah so then we know yeah and it's really about getting your mind saying okay now i'm going to put my catchs in really super good i know they're good at the moment i'm going to put them in super good and we're going to do a race pace of about 30 strokes a minute for 10 10 strokes if 10's a bit short then go for 15. yep you start off with 10. you try for ten but but there's also a bit of an advantage in being able to get your technique right and then go because in a race you can use that pretty effectively let's start off ten slowly then yeah we can get the boat moving yeah yeah you're going to have your arms pretty well parallel with the boat with the gunwale when you please say like that's parallel parallel is parallel with their shoulder in the gutter almost okay um Lou can you balance it sure and so just put your arms up so that you've got them so hang on to the oars and put the blade in square now that's a bit too far but see if you look at where marie's or is so look at the stroke or here a little bit deeper perhaps deeper deeper about there and so yeah okay so if you match where so put them that deep and if you do the same
and then think about where your arms are in relation to the gunwale and so now take them out of the water holding your body still so just put your hands down so they're out of the water now put them back in again that deep yeah it's 10 centimetres that's how far one that's a long way yeah you want it to go up that far as you put it in the water so normally we just go to there yeah so it's quite deep and so it's a distinct movement and then interesting when we were doing the the pause one the pause one went in like that and the other ones went in like this yeah so every stroke we want to put it in end of the front cannot pick up the load go
all right let's go so this particular drill of 10 strokes on 10 strokes off and doing it with purpose and making sure that before you start the 10 strokes on you make sure that the catch is well connected deep and connected for those last two strokes before the fast piece and then do the fast piece making sure all the time that you've got your blades deep and well connected it's a really useful skill to learn so that when you're in a race environment you can actually do that during the race so if you're about to do a piece where you want to put a burst of extra speed on then focus on your technique first get your catches in get them in quickly get them in deep and then do the fast pace it's a really useful discipline to understand and use in training and in racing
and then think about where your arms are in relation to the gunwale and so now take them out of the water holding your body still so just put your hands down so they're out of the water now put them back in again that deep yeah it's 10 centimetres that's how far one that's a long way yeah you want it to go up that far as you put it in the water so normally we just go to there yeah so it's quite deep and so it's a distinct movement and then interesting when we were doing the the pause one the pause one went in like that and the other ones went in like this yeah so every stroke we want to put it in end of the front cannot pick up the load go
all right let's go so this particular drill of 10 strokes on 10 strokes off and doing it with purpose and making sure that before you start the 10 strokes on you make sure that the catch is well connected deep and connected for those last two strokes before the fast piece and then do the fast piece making sure all the time that you've got your blades deep and well connected it's a really useful skill to learn so that when you're in a race environment you can actually do that during the race so if you're about to do a piece where you want to put a burst of extra speed on then focus on your technique first get your catches in get them in quickly get them in deep and then do the fast pace it's a really useful discipline to understand and use in training and in racing