Recovery - the pause drill

[Bob S.]

I have posted comments about the recovery on a couple of different threads recently. It is a subject that is often ignored by those who are new to rowing/erging. Then I remembered the pause drill. I don't see any use for it on the erg, unless you have a flexible seat installed, but it is a very valuable technique for improving OTW performance. The stroke starts and ends with your legs and arms straight and your back vertical - the middle of the recovery. At the command "row," you bend at the hips and use your legs to bring the slide to the stops. The drive follows and the stroke is completed at the point where your arms have straightened and your hands are past your knees - i.e. back to the starting point. Then you pause for some specified time before you take the next stroke. If it is a coxed boat, the cox calls “row” for the next stroke. I don't know how it is done in an uncoxed crew, but in a single it is your own choice.

The pause drill can really exaggerate any flaws in technique, especially poor balance, but, if it is well executed, it is a great feeling to have the boat gliding steadily with the beveled oars all evenly spaced, just clear of the water. In a single, a really well balanced sculler could hold the pause indefinitely. For most of us ordinary folks, it is a good way to try to improve our techniques.

I see one possible value to doing this on an erg – at least for a few strokes. It emphasizes the sequence of movements of the recovery, breaking it down into getting your hands away and then following with back swing and bringing up the slide. With a tippy seat, it would also help to develop better balance.

Bob S.

[Byron Drachman]

Hi Bob,
Xeno has you do some pause drills on his training DVD's. Do you have them? They're great fun. A benefit of a pause drill on the erg is you can look in the mirror and check if you're really holding your back as straight as you want, etc. I have a homemade tippy seat on my erg, and it does help improve balance. And yes, I try pause drills on the water to work on balance as well as square blade rowing, etc. I'm not that experienced on water yet, but I have noticed that with good balance everything else is much easier.
Byron

[gorow9]

Pause drills work wonders on the water, I agree. I also discovered 3/4 slide yesterday to help with backsplash at the catch. It is easier to back the oars in earlier and get a good splash and smoother catch at 3/4 slide. By leghtening it over 10 strokes it helped me a lot. My coach has been working on this backsplash thing for a few months and it never clicked until yesterday.

I am always aware of what other rowers are doing at the catch now because my coach has impressed it into my head for months. It seems that missing water by not backing the blades in is pretty common. I did some puase drills as well for this. Sometimes it helps to make the puase every 5 strokes or so, it gives you time to forget to think about technique. Pause drills can also puase at the finish or the catch if people have trouble with a particular area of the stroke. I like to puase after the leg drive in teh stroke when there is still back angel and arms not pulled thorugh yet.

By the way what is a flexible seat?

[Byron Drachman]

Hi Sara,

Coreperform makes a seat that can be set to be unstable or stable by moving a lever:

http://www.coreperform.com/product.php

I didn't realize that it was available from CorePerform so I made a simple version out of some scraps of wood. When I remove the wooden dowel the seat is stable. When the seat rests on the wooden dowel, the seat is unstable and that works the abs and core in general. I found it helpful in developing strength around the middle and balance, which in turn is useful on the water:

Apologies for repeating this posting. It was on the forum before but it's gone now. Xeno Muller's upper body rowing workout DVD is also good for working on core strength and flexibility.
A friend of mine got the seat from CorePerform and says it is very nicely made.

Byron

[helpplease]

Hey bob,
My boat seems to have problems keeping the boat set during that pause drills, it is hard to keep all the oars off when we arent moving for little time; any tricks you could tell me would be great!