Did you know these five key principles of an effective rowing technique?
- During recovery, the angle of the trunk must be constant after the “transitional position” (knee angle at 90 °), avoiding additional “diving” in the capture.
- Later, the rowers begin to push on the stretcher and slow down the seat before capture, the better.
- An appropriate capture factor and a “rebound” of sharp legs to capture allow effective acceleration of the mass of the rower and a powerful well -connected drive.
- A fast leg reader, emphasizing the application of the stretcher force, produces a loaded, high and full curve.
- The rapid insertion of the blade after the capture is crucial to exploit the hydro-lift effect and improve the efficiency of the propulsion of the blade.
During our recent Biorow Tests, we obtained interesting data that required in -depth analysis. Two M2 crews were tested consecutively using the standard Biorow Test protocol (a speed of steps over a total distance of 2000 m), with an interval of 10 minutes between them, under the same favorable weather conditions (light rear wind). The boats, the trains and the rigging were identical (Enter, Concept2 Skinny Smoothie2, 116/376/85 cm), and the two crews had average physical parameters and similar ergometer scores. The crew 1 systematically surpassed crew 2 and, at the race rate of 36 to 37 SPM, was 2.1% faster (7.9 seconds over 2 km). Naturally, rowers and coaches asked for an explanation of this difference in performance, so we decided to publish this as a case study on rowing efficiency.
The most obvious difference between the two crews was at the time of accelerating the boat in the privilege: in crew 1, the negative acceleration peak occurred after capture, while in crew 2, it occurred before capture. When traced compared to the rowing angles, the acceleration curve of the crew 1 formed a small loop in terms of the capture, which was absent in the crew 2. During the training phase, the crew 1 had a first peak of positive acceleration and a less deep drop.
The force curves were similar after the capture and before the arrival, but differ in the middle of the journey: crew 1 produced more strength, with a higher and anterior peak. The racing lengths were also quite similar between the two crews.
The speed of the seat revealed the most pronounced differences. During recovery, crew 1 had a subsequent negative peak that crew 2, indicating a subsequent transition of shooting on the stretcher. At the capture, the crew 2 reversed the movement of the seats earlier, resulting in a more negative capture factor (–30 ms), compared to the crew 1 (–16 ms). This was mainly due to the arc rower in the crew 2 having an excessively negative capture factor of –40 ms combined with the upper body movement towards the stern before the capture, often called “diving with the trunk in the capture”. In the first half of the journey, Crew 1 reached a significantly higher peak seat speed, which helped them produce much more force and finished the leg player earlier by developing a higher speed of the trunk.
Crew 1 also showed more efficient blade work. They inserted the blade faster in terms of capture, which led to a shorter capture sliding (7.9 °) compared to the crew 2 (12.2 °). The problem of crew 2 probably came from the “skying” of the blade before capture, caused by the reduction of too much the handle. During the second half of the drive, crew 1 maintained a less deep but sufficient blade depth, which ensured a good connection of water and resulted in a longer effective drive length (62.5%) compared to crew 2 (59.1%) and a higher blade efficiency.
In the end, despite a slightly lower race rate, with a length and physiology of similar stroke, crew 1 generated 5.9% higher and 5.7% higher power. Combined with the higher blade efficiency of 1.9%, this resulted in a boat speed of 2.1% higher.
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© 2025 Dr Valery Kleshnev