Improving But Needing a Form Check!

[Dangerscouse]

Also I like to sit a bit further forward on the seat, I think it helps my hinging motion.

Thank you for all of your comments but especially this tip! This combined with dropping the foot plates has me feeling like I'm sitting up straighter and able to swing more at the hips instead of curving the back.

Imo, and I am probably massively in the minority, don't adjust too much with your knee position if this results in you not enjoying rowing. It's best to not have it past vertical but I also think you can make it work even if it is past vertical.

You do have to take a step back to take two steps forward

My last post was right after I was done rowing and I was pretty frustrated. I'm willing to take a step back if it means I'll be able to move forward. I'm not a very physically coordinated person but I really would like to get back to doing the 2:03/500m for an hour I used to be able to row. I don't know if my form back then was bad and I just made it work or if I used to just have better technique and not rowing for so long made me lose it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dt39jMYjZbw

This video is from today. I put a piece of packing tape on the rail so I can feel the rollers on my seat bump it when I get to it. That's helped me from rolling too far forward.

The much shorter seat slide and lower foot positioning feels like it has transferred a lot of the rowing stroke force from my legs to my arms. This row it felt like my arms had a much higher work out and my legs a lot less. It also could be that the overall reduced drive length is making me put in more work to row the same distance and I'm just feeling that in my arms more. It felt like I was keeping a much straighter torso compared to my first video, but comparing them both maybe that's not really the case.

If I was you I'd get more compressed at the catch of you don't feel it as much in your legs. You really need to feel the initial push coming from your legs otherwise you will tire too quickly doing a 60 mins session.

[hjs]

I don,t like the finish of your stroke, its way to soft, your legs should really push with muscles contracted. And to counter this you should pull in the handle more firm. It now looks soft, you should try to put energy in the handle during the whole stroke. It now fades of in the last part.
Second thing, hips, try to pivot those more, maybe difficult, but the better you can do this, the stronger your stroke can be.

[ampire]

Some observations on the second video:
Try a lower drag factor like 100, and try to push with your legs and then pull with arms and back as fast as possible. If you have ergdata app you can see the drive speed on the app. It should seem like a snappy pull. Then the recovery should be nice, easy and slow.
I think the recovery into catch was better on the first video, as the rock over seems forced now. Despite sitting forward, you still need to keep your center of mass over the seat on the recovery rather than leaning excessively forward with your upper body.
Try going deeper into the catch and bringing knees further forward, shins slightly more vertical, if you are limited on this try hamstring and calf stretches. You can also lift heels to get more depth. This looked better on the first video. I think the longer drive length of the first video was better. Might have to do with the foot position change, making it harder to lift heels to compress into the catch.
Coming out of the catch into the drive, you are using arms and shoulders too early in the stroke relative to your legs. Try to drive out with your heel and midfoot and let the push of the legs make the handle dig into your fingertips. The arms should be utilized at the middle point to the end point, as initially they should serve mostly as a connection point to the handle for your leg drive.

This might also help
https://youtu.be/cTcGnUsF6fk

[Erik A]

with regards to a straight back i find that if i concentrate and squeeze my shoulder blades together at the finish i stay in a upright position. it does take a bit of getting used to and you will find that you will get some muscle soreness after a while