Any coaches available?

[johnnyd]

Hi, i am searching for a coach for the upcoming erg season. My history is with ultradistance cycling and now distance running with the current goal of a half and full marathon by November 1 at the New York Marathon. My previous erg training has basically been online rowing with various groups and some races in the CT-NY-MA area in erg contests from January to March, of course including crash-b. I am a 48 year old lightweight male-fastest time so far-7:03.8-looking for a person to do whatever testing is necessary including lactate threshold and then to write a training plan for erg sessions to start right after the Marathon and with the idea of scoring my fastest possible time at the 2010 crash b.

[Citroen]

Pete Marston may be able to offer what you need (minus the lactate testing as Pete is 3000+ miles away) http://thepeteplan.wordpress.com/pete-plan-coaching/

[Alissa]

Xeno Muller offers coaching in various formats: www.ironoarsman.com If you're not sure what fits your needs, give him a call.

Alissa

[Yankeerunner]

Paul Smith from Washington state has had good results coaching via the internet. Several medalists at the CRASH-Bs, including Gold, as well as at least two World Record holders have done their feats while under his guidance.

Try here:

http://www.ps-sport.net/

Rick

[TomR]

Tom Bohrer is in MA.

Former Olympian. Mike Van Buren, who won the 55 (I think) lwt at Crash-B recently followed Tom's plan.

www.tbfit.com

[ranger]

Hi, i am searching for a coach for the upcoming erg season. My history is with ultradistance cycling and now distance running with the current goal of a half and full marathon by November 1 at the New York Marathon. My previous erg training has basically been online rowing with various groups and some races in the CT-NY-MA area in erg contests from January to March, of course including crash-b. I am a 48 year old lightweight male-fastest time so far-7:03.8-looking for a person to do whatever testing is necessary including lactate threshold and then to write a training plan for erg sessions to start right after the Marathon and with the idea of scoring my fastest possible time at the 2010 crash b.

I would forget about lactate testing, etc., for the moment.

If you only pull 7:04 for 2K as a 40s lwt, you need to learn to row.

This task is more technical and skeletal-muscular than physiological.

You have to learn how a proper rowing stroke is sequenced, timed, leveraged, etc.

No need for a coach in order to learn these things.

Just post a video øf your rowing, say, 500m, 1:40 @ 30 spm (10 MPS, 11.7 SPI).

That should tell the story.

You will get a lot of feedback here about the technical mistakes you are making, enough to work on for several years.

If you are really serious about rowing, the best way to learn to row is to get a 1x and row at least half of your meters OTW.

ranger

[NavigationHazard]

If you're serious about desiring a lactate test and a HR-associated training program, consider giving the GMS Rowing Center in New Milford CT a call. They'll do the test for you an an erg, and discuss how you can incorporate the results into an athlete-specific program. Several of the OTW rowers in my club swear by it. The guy who runs the place is a former German international and coach who used to do lactate testing for the German national team.

I have no affiliation with them whatsoever, and have not myself used their services.

If you're in the greater NY area, drop me a PM.

[ranger]

Pete Marston may be able to offer what you need (minus the lactate testing as Pete is 3000+ miles away) http://thepeteplan.wordpress.com/pete-plan-coaching/

Pete pulls a heavyweight 6:16 at 32 years old.

Given a decline of a second a year over 2K, that means he is on track to pull at heavyweight 6:34 when he is 50 years old.

A heavyweight 6:34 is the equivalent of a lighweight 6:51, which will become equivalent to a lightweight 6:56 by the time Pete is 55, and a lightweight 7:01 by the time Pete is 60.

This means that, by and large, Pete doesn't row any better than you.

Wouldn't you want a coach that know more about rowing and training than you do?

ranger

[Steve G]

Pete Marston may be able to offer what you need (minus the lactate testing as Pete is 3000+ miles away) http://thepeteplan.wordpress.com/pete-plan-coaching/

Pete pulls a heavyweight 6:16 at 32 years old.

Given a decline of a second a year over 2K, that means he is on track to pull at heavyweight 6:34 when he is 50 years old.

A heavyweight 6:34 is the equivalent of a lighweight 6:51, which will become equivalent to a lightweight 6:56 by the time Pete is 55, and a lightweight 7:01 by the time Pete is 60.

This means that, by and large, Pete doesn't row any better than you.

Wouldn't you want a coach that know more about rowing and training than you do?

ranger

I am sure Pete will offer sound advise, he doesnt just talk about what he is going to do etc and fail to deliver like Ranger. Probably the last thing on Petes mind is turning 60!!
Good luck.

[ranger]

Probably the last thing on Petes mind is turning 60!!

Then why does he row like he's 60!

He's only 32.

ranger

[Janice]

He's only 32.

He's 31.

[Yankeerunner]

He's only 32.

He's 31.

Thanks for the correction Janice. I suspect that you know him better than most.

If I might add, if not as a correction but as a defense of a smear, Pete has had many a satisfied protege. Some with medals, many with personal bests that have happily and publicly acknowledged Pete's help.

My recollection is that Pete's Plan developed out of his use of the Wolverine Plan, altering it to suit his own likes and dislikes which have turned out to have suit others as well. If I also am recalling things correctly many ergers expressed the desire to be coached personally by Mike Caviston and were willing to pay Mike for it, believing in the Wolverine Plan and wanting hands-on (so to speak) help with it from the guru himself. Unfortunately Mike respectfully declined, due to having too much going on at once to want to take on personal coaching, but feeling that he could better help by answering questions as they came up on the forums to the general audience and encouraging them to develop their own routine based on science as he presented it.

Pete stepped in to offer the personal touch that others were disinclined to offer at that time. And from reading the forums, that has benefited a sizeable group of enthusiasts. I find it hard to fault that and feel that the criticism above was unwarranted.


Also, while on the subject of online coaching, it occurs to me that we have left out another of the coaches who has been having success and that's Eddie Fletcher. I think that Eddie can be contacted here:
http://www.fletchersportscience.co.uk/

[Bob S.]

There seems to be a common misconception that skill at a sport and the ability to coach that sport are related. Nothing could be further from the truth. The coaches that I had at UC Berkeley in the 1940s were living examples of coaches who had not even participated in the sport of rowing — as oarsmen. Russ Nagler and Carroll “Ky” Ebright were each about 5’4” and 120#. I doubt that either of them pulled many strokes except when demonstrating a point to their oarsmen. There was almost no prep school rowing in California, so Nagler, the freshman coach taught almost all of Cal’s oarsmen from scratch. Then Ebright put them together in crews that won Olympic gold for eights in 1928, 1932, and 1948. There were also several years when the UCB varsity eight won the Intercollegiate Rowing Association Regatta at Poughkeepsie. As you might surmise, they had been coxswains and, as such, had learned to judge oarsmen well enough to do a topnotch job of coaching them. Ebright’s own coach, Hiram Conibear, inventor of the rowing stroke that was the most effective from the 1910s through the 1950s, had been a baseball trainer and got into coaching crew at the University of Washington even though, as he himself admitted, he didn’t know the first thing about rowing.

For the story of Conibear, check the following site:
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/artic ... 86,00.html

A contemporary of Nagler and Ebright at Berkeley was coach Clarence M. “Nibs” Price. He was about their size and coached both football (27-17-3) and basketball (449-294).

Bob S.

[ranger]

I am sure Pete will offer sound advise, he doesnt just talk about what he is going to do etc and fail to deliver like Ranger.

Depends on what you are delivering, no?

Delivering something that is 30 seconds over the WR is a bit different from delivering something that is 30 seconds under the WR.

If I say I can't do anything, and then don't, am I a success?

Apparently, from your point of view.

Pretty easy to be a "winner" with those standards.

Contemporary educational theory.

Leave no child behind.

Make everyone a loser.

ranger

[ranger]

There seems to be a common misconception that skill at a sport and the ability to coach that sport are related. Nothing could be further from the truth. The coaches that I had at UC Berkeley in the 1940s were living examples of coaches who had not even participated in the sport of rowing — as oarsmen. Russ Nagler and Carroll “Ky” Ebright were each about 5’4” and 120#. I doubt that either of them pulled many strokes except when demonstrating a point to their oarsmen. There was almost no prep school rowing in California, so Nagler, the freshman coach taught almost all of Cal’s oarsmen from scratch. Then Ebright put them together in crews that won Olympic gold for eights in 1928, 1932, and 1948. There were also several years when the UCB varsity eight won the Intercollegiate Rowing Association Regatta at Poughkeepsie. As you might surmise, they had been coxswains and, as such, had learned to judge oarsmen well enough to do a topnotch job of coaching them. Ebright’s own coach, Hiram Conibear, inventor of the rowing stroke that was the most effective from the 1910s through the 1950s, had been a baseball trainer and got into coaching crew at the University of Washington even though, as he himself admitted, he didn’t know the first thing about rowing.

For the story of Conibear, check the following site:
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/artic ... 86,00.html

A contemporary of Nagler and Ebright at Berkeley was coach Clarence M. “Nibs” Price. He was about their size and coached both football (27-17-3) and basketball (449-294).

Bob S.

Pete has never rowed OTW at all.

He has no experience with it.

He has never coached anything.

He doesn't even have a substantial sports background.

He has very little experience with sport.

Pete's trianing plan avoids everythinig that is foundational to rowing--skeletal-muscular training, technique, endurance training, and endless repetition (brute commitment of time).

He just sharpens!

You will never row your best if you just sharpen.

ranger