Trusting Yourself at The Front End
by COC Sculling Coach, Troy Howell
The front end is the keystone of the sculling (and rowing) stroke.
That's not just something to say as a coach, and if anything, it is understated and among my top-five list of things I wish that I had realized much sooner about sculling. It hides in plain sight, with every sculler who feels any hesitation or anxiety at all as she approaches the transition from the recovery to the drive. And just as any arch whose keystone was poorly selected, cut, and chiseled by the mason has weaknesses throughout that will eventually cause the arch to fall, a sculling stroke whose front end is poorly executed by the sculler will have weaknesses throughout the rest of the cycle that can be traced back to the imperfect front end.
One of the main reasons that we rush the second half of the slide is our unwillingness to spend much time at the front end. Every sculler learns very quickly that the drive and the back end of the stroke are positions of relative stability. At mid-drive our single is effectively 17 feet wide from blade tip to blade tip, and when we let go of the water at the release, the oars are not far past perpendicular to the boat. We feel secure there. Throughout the recovery, by contrast, unless we are deliberately skimming the blades, our single has narrowed from the 12-18 feet from blade tip to blade tip down to the roughly 10 inch width of the hull. And as we approach the front end while doing our best to keep both blades off the water, we know that we are in what feels like trickier territory. Further, our blades are behind us, entirely out of our field of vision. Finally, we are faced with what is generally regarded as the most difficult aspect of the stroke to master: the timing of the entry and catch. The potentially disheartening fact of the matter is that you can scull for decades and never transcend the fear and trembling that many (most?) scullers experience at the front end, and too many people do exactly that.
The good news is that developing genuine comfort and confidence around the front end is within reach for almost everyone, and all that is necessary is a commitment to gradually and deliberately train the nervous system. Just as no one tells a toddler that standing up is an inherently unstable affair (who would ever learn to walk if we began with the premise that standing is dangerous?) and no one tells a beginning gymnast that "handstands are really hard and a lot of people will never figure it out", no sculler should view the front end as an inherently unstable place. Once a toddler learns to stand with little or no wobbling, walking becomes readily achievable. Once a gymnast can perform a stable handstand, other more complex moves become easier to learn. Once a sculler gains real comfort and stability at the front end, other aspects of their stroke will be easier to improve.
The process begins with acceptance of the premise with which we began: that the front end is the keystone of the stroke. Follow that with a commitment to train your nervous system to be at home there and the innocent faith of a toddler learning to stand.
Start with two things, both of them dead simple:
1) Every time you stop rowing, whether to rest, get a drink, or because the drill or piece is over, make a habit of starting from the front end instead of the back end. "Whenever you stop, start" is the way Larry Gluckman put it to his crews. The idea is that if you always begin rowing from the stable position of the release/back end, you'll continue to think of the front end as unstable, whereas if you get in the habit of starting at the front end with the blades in the water, you become habituated to overcoming whatever anxiety you may feel about that position. Remember - it's not the boat that is tippy, it's you - and your nervous system is capable of learning. Granted that there are a few drills that have to start at the release (arms only/pic springs to mind), but most drills and all pieces can and should start at the front end.
2) Make it part of your routine to spend some time doing stationary drills that involve sitting at the front end EVERY TIME YOU GO OUT. It doesn't have to be much - even a minute just after you leave the dock and another minute just before you land will yield remarkable results in a matter of days. Yes, you have time - do 28 minutes of steady state instead of 30, or 14 x 1' rather than 15. Start with the most manageable things: just sitting at the front end with blades feathered, feeling the boat under your hips and maintaining handle heights that keep you even-keeled. Progress from there to doing the same thing with square blades. Then learn to do the tapping drill at the front end, or tap and balance with the blades out of the water. Then to sit at the front end with blades feathered and let go of one oar handle. It's remarkable how much stability you have by managing the boat with your hips and the handle that you've continued to hold. As Ric Ricci is fond of saying, "you don't have to hold the oars - the oarlocks are already doing that for you." Note, finally, that this nervous system-oriented work is not physically strenuous, but it does work your brain harder that you may realize. Doing the drill for a few seconds, sitting easy, and repeating the same drill two or three times will yield better results than stubbornly persisting without a break.
Once you learn to trust yourself at the front end, you'll be a bullet-proof sculler that you can't even conceive of now. It sets you free to move as slowly and patiently into and out of the front end as you wish, which will result in radical improvement to your rhythm. It makes it possible to keep the blades off the water until you're ready to unweight the handles and let gravity and the momentum of the boat perform the entry instead of placing the blades deliberately and clumsily while the boat is tipping to port or starboard. Above all, it facilitates the relaxation and confidence necessary to scull in a state of flow. Create a perfect keystone and the arch will be magnificent.