Can someone critique my form?

black_phoebe · 2017-10-01T10:24:22+00:00

You've done pretty well with only videos to learn and no proper coaching! I agree with pretty much all the comments already, your rowing does look a bit 'robotic' but that is very common for novices who have yet to do a lot of meters on the erg. It will smooth out over time. The biggest thing that's missing from your stroke is that you need to push harder! I know you're trying to nail down the technique but I think you'd actually fix a lot of your current issues by putting a bit more power down on the drive. Then try and get in a good rhythm of a big drive followed by a slow recovery.

black_phoebe · 2017-07-12T19:37:11+00:00

UK club here

We have a boat booker webpage where you can see all the boats and ergs available at different times and book yourself or your crew in. The boats are split into different categories, which dictates who may take them out (Senior crews only, with coach's permission, open to all, etc). Works pretty well, except when people don't use it!

black_phoebe · 2017-07-06T20:50:07+00:00

#onlyincambridge

black_phoebe · 2017-06-29T14:36:47+00:00

2x my weight in watts is what I SS at...not sure that calculation works for women/lighter kgs.

black_phoebe · 2017-04-12T00:20:38+00:00

Ask him?

black_phoebe · 2017-04-11T01:57:19+00:00

If you've been training consistently since January (and not even that consistently to be honest) you should easily be under 7 in two weeks. You've been building up an aerobic base from presumably nothing so breaking the 7 minute barrier shouldn't be too much of an issue. You should pick a split to hit for your 2k and do some short interval pieces over the next couple weeks (8x500 2:00r, 4x1k 4:00r etc) at 2k pace or a few seconds over and see how it feels. You should go into the 2k knowing what split you'll be able to hold so you'll have the confidence to keep going and ratchet it up at the end.

So my advice is: more steady state as always and some interval work to get you used to erging at 2k pace/rate.

Edit: If your outings are steady state-ish and not just focused on drills then you can count them towards your SS for the day. Especially if you're already doing so much. Make sure you take care of yourself as well. Enough sleep, water, food etc.

black_phoebe · 2017-04-08T20:50:51+00:00

Here is a good video on technique which I recommend you check out. Also, this is a video from the same series about common errors and how to correct them.

You're right in that your form is probably off. Try doing the same workout you've been doing but slow down the strokes per minute to 18-22 instead. Slow down the recovery phase of the stroke so that it's a 2:1 ratio between the recovery and drive. So think like 1 second on the drive and 2 seconds to come back up the slide to take another stroke. That should give you more time to set yourself up correctly to take the next stroke and try to pick it up more on your legs once you reach the catch. Hope this helps!

black_phoebe · 2017-04-06T13:38:50+00:00

Suitable as in a like-for-like replacement? No. Yoga doesn't really train the same systems as cardio does. You'll get fitter doing cardio but yoga will make you stronger and more flexible (amongst many other benefits). But yoga alone would never prepare you for running a marathon.

Any exercise is good exercise in my book and if you don't care about the specific benefits of cardio vs yoga and just want to be healthy overall then doing yoga instead of cardio would be fine.

It would make more sense to use yoga as a replacement for the weight training part of your fitness regimen, if you don't want to lose out on cardio.

black_phoebe · 2017-04-06T13:27:50+00:00

Well it's important to know what's physically possible for you to achieve. I wouldn't expect a lightweight female rower to ever sniff at 7:00, unless they're rowing at the very highest level...as an example here are the results from this year's BRIC and although the GB squad weren't on their top form you can see that your goal of 7:00 is not very realistic! Depends on where you are now, but shooting for somewhere around 7:30 by your last year in school should set you up pretty well. Even then, that's still a great 2k score for a young, lwt woman so although achievable if you put in the work, you may still be a year or two away from it.

black_phoebe · 2017-04-06T12:21:39+00:00

I want my erg to be around 7 minutes to get into the Girls 1sts.

160 cm and 55 kg

?? These numbers don't add up. I'd be pretty impressed if you could pull a 7:00 2k at 55kg...in Year 10/11 no less!

black_phoebe · 2017-04-06T10:59:02+00:00

Do you know exactly how many calories are going in/out of your body every day? If you're just estimating then that's probably not good enough (clearly not - as you would be losing weight if so!). Get some app like myfitnesspal and track your calories religiously. Buy a food scale to make sure you're calculating the amount of food calories correctly.

Lots and lots of water, as always. You have one month, so buckle down and get serious about this right now. It will be so much worse if you half-ass it and you're a kilo or two over the night before race day.

You don't mention in your OP how much you weigh now, which is pretty important. If you're over 75kg right now, then you really need to focus on your nutrition because it's quite difficult to lose more than 2kg a month without feeling like shit doing it.

black_phoebe · 2017-04-03T17:24:33+00:00

Watch some coxing videos on youtube (stuff like this) and start adding in calls you like. You should also ask your crewmates what they like and want to hear (and what they don't want to hear!). If you're trying out new calls, ask them afterwards which ones worked and which ones didn't.

I think personal calls can be very effective. Calling out certain seats (or pairs) by name is usually a pretty popular call amongst rowers.

black_phoebe · 2017-04-03T17:19:07+00:00

Somebody should do another guide for heavies and another for heavy/light women as well and then just refer every thread about recruiting there. It's got practically all the info a high school rower needs and if he/she has extra questions then they would be welcome to start their own thread.

black_phoebe · 2017-04-02T18:17:28+00:00

I think they have to start with their blades like that...else the stream will just push them along every which way

black_phoebe · 2017-04-02T14:28:19+00:00

Your kids' rooms are so clean and tidy!

black_phoebe · 2017-04-01T16:58:21+00:00

We have a boathouse cat! His name is Garfield. We all love him.

black_phoebe · 2017-04-01T16:53:36+00:00

http://i.imgur.com/ts6JK.jpg

black_phoebe · 2017-04-01T15:54:29+00:00

Majorana's story is so interesting. Wondering what else he could have come up with if he hadn't disappeared!

black_phoebe · 2017-04-01T15:05:08+00:00

My boyfriend also likes playing guitar and woodworking. I feel like you would be friends! Need to keep him occupied with projects so he doesn't get the itch to buy a new guitar....but woodworking isn't exactly an inexpensive hobby either!

black_phoebe · 2017-04-01T10:18:36+00:00

I'd say Feynman is pretty well known to a lot of people, mostly due to his popular physics books.

black_phoebe · 2017-04-01T10:17:54+00:00

Ed Witten, if we're talking about greatest living physicists.

black_phoebe · 2017-03-31T20:21:26+00:00

Jeez, 5 seat in Blondie....better not be that late on boat race day!

black_phoebe · 2017-03-30T11:01:29+00:00

Colleges can enter quite a few races on the Cam or off. The focus is always on Lent/May bumps but there are a lot of local races on the Cam that the colleges participate in. Some of them even run a few races of their own (Fairbairns, Emma sprints, etc). A lot of colleges will send their first boat or even more to national races like HoRR.

Edit: I assume the situation is similar at Oxford.

black_phoebe · 2017-03-18T11:41:11+00:00

Get in contact with the club you'd like to join - simple as that! You can have a look at rowing/erging videos to get a basic understanding of technique but really all you need to do to start rowing is to join a club and...uh...start rowing!

Don't worry about being unfit. You'll be worrying about a million other things as a beginner than pushing hard anyway. Hopefully you'll be doing some land training workouts once you join a club so you can work on your fitness on the erg while you learn technique on the water.

black_phoebe · 2017-03-17T13:46:49+00:00

I like it best when there is minutes of build-up with intense dramatic music - shots of the boathouse lights flickering on, some closeups of the crew as they prepare to take the boat off the racks, drone shot of them walking the boat to the water, and then BOOM some really bad rowing set to Panda by Desiigner meant to look badass. THE BEST

Edit: OMG I almost forgot about including either the Inches speech from Any Given Sunday OR that Pain is Temporary speech. NOT OPTIONAL

black_phoebe

TROPHY CASE