Photos courtesy of Andy Patt
Friday, April 24, 2009
Saturday, April 11, 2009
Holland 8 Training - Reprise
This video of the dutch 8 practicing before the olympics, at which they won the gold, exemplifies many of the technical elements we have been practicing lately: body angles, leg drives, acceleration, and quicker catches.
0:00-1:00 - Body angle at the finish
1:00-2:00 - Catching the blade before driving the legs.
*Notice when the camera is in close on the rowers you can see the blade of the rower in front entering the water before the rower in view is driving. The blade enters the water first.
2:00-3:00 - Emphasis and acceleration on the leg drive - not the finish.
3:00-4:00 - Rating comes up slightly and catches aggresive.
4:00-5:00 - Speed of the oar in the water.
Courtesy of YouTube and Row2k
0:00-1:00 - Body angle at the finish
1:00-2:00 - Catching the blade before driving the legs.
*Notice when the camera is in close on the rowers you can see the blade of the rower in front entering the water before the rower in view is driving. The blade enters the water first.
2:00-3:00 - Emphasis and acceleration on the leg drive - not the finish.
3:00-4:00 - Rating comes up slightly and catches aggresive.
4:00-5:00 - Speed of the oar in the water.
Courtesy of YouTube and Row2k
Friday, April 10, 2009
USRowing Spotlight: Q&A with Colin Campbell
By Allison Frederick
Colin Campbell is returning for his third season as the USRowing junior national team men’s head coach. Last year, he led the junior men’s eight to a bronze medal at the 2008 FISA World Rowing Senior and Junior Championships. Prior to taking over head coaching duties, Campbell served as a junior national team assistant coach, helping the U.S. win gold in the eight in 2005. Before joining Peddie School as the boy’s head coach in 2002, Campbell coached at St. Mark’s School, St. Paul’s School and Cincinnati Country Day School.
USRowing: You’ve coached several past U.S. junior teams and development camps, including last year’s bronze-medal crew. How will your experiences benefit you in building a successful junior team this year? Campbell: I have gotten more and more specific in defining and articulating what athletes need to do to prepare for, and to compete successfully at, the world championship level. I have also worked with Craig Hoffman, the Junior Men's Committee, Steve Hargis, and others at USRowing and around the country to rebuild the development camp structure that I first helped to establish in 1996 and 1997. With the layering of camps and opportunities, oarsmen and coxswains are more aware of what they need to do to prepare for international competition, and they are more experienced when they arrive first at selection camp and then at the world championships. This more extensive preparation should help the athletes prepare more thoroughly and race more effectively.
USRowing: What specific goals do you have for the junior national team this summer? Campbell: We are going to select an eight and a coxed four from the sweep camp and a quad from the sculling camp. We are also going to send two pairs and several doubles to trials. My goals for the summer are to run the most efficient, most effective camp I can, to select and prepare the best possible crews for the competition at the world championships and to win medals in at least two of four events.
USRowing: Can you describe the process for athlete selection from the beginning of the summer, up until the world championships? Campbell: We are going to bring 26 sweep oarsmen and 6 coxswains to Mercer Lake for the sweep camp. From that pool, we are going to build an eight and a coxed four, as well as two pairs that will compete at trials for the right to compete at the world championships. The selection process for the eight and the four will follow roughly the same guidelines we have used in the past four years. We do a lot of work in eights and fours, testing combinations and speed over 1,000-meter, 1,250-meter and 1,500-meter intervals. Using this data and some data from direct switches, we will designate an eight and a four that will compete at the world championships. From the remaining athletes, we will select two pairs, which will then race at trials for the right to compete at worlds.
USRowing: You’ve been the boys head coach at Peddie since 2002. Before that, you coached St. Mark’s School, St. Paul’s School and Cincinnati Country Day School. What do you enjoy most about coaching rowing at the high school level? Campbell: Rowing is a sport that rewards investment and effort. Many of the athletes that I have coached are not gifted physical athletes but have been able to compete very successfully at the high school and collegiate levels through determination and hard work. I have always focused on the commitment that athletes need to bring to their work in rowing, and I have always felt most successful when those athletes who are not exceptionally gifted have performed well.
USRowing: What are some of the biggest challenges of coaching at the junior level? Campbell: It is hard to get juniors to understand that their physical and psychological capacities are far greater than they recognize. Tony Johnson, my college coach, always used to challenge us to work beyond what we believed to be our limits. I think this is the greatest challenge with juniors because they are capable of far greater efforts and far stronger performances than many of them realize. Another challenge is training. High school students are very busy. They have a great deal on their plates, and training properly takes more time, energy, and discipline than many of them want to recognize or are prepared to commit.
Courtesy of USRowing
Colin Campbell is returning for his third season as the USRowing junior national team men’s head coach. Last year, he led the junior men’s eight to a bronze medal at the 2008 FISA World Rowing Senior and Junior Championships. Prior to taking over head coaching duties, Campbell served as a junior national team assistant coach, helping the U.S. win gold in the eight in 2005. Before joining Peddie School as the boy’s head coach in 2002, Campbell coached at St. Mark’s School, St. Paul’s School and Cincinnati Country Day School.
USRowing: You’ve coached several past U.S. junior teams and development camps, including last year’s bronze-medal crew. How will your experiences benefit you in building a successful junior team this year? Campbell: I have gotten more and more specific in defining and articulating what athletes need to do to prepare for, and to compete successfully at, the world championship level. I have also worked with Craig Hoffman, the Junior Men's Committee, Steve Hargis, and others at USRowing and around the country to rebuild the development camp structure that I first helped to establish in 1996 and 1997. With the layering of camps and opportunities, oarsmen and coxswains are more aware of what they need to do to prepare for international competition, and they are more experienced when they arrive first at selection camp and then at the world championships. This more extensive preparation should help the athletes prepare more thoroughly and race more effectively.
USRowing: What specific goals do you have for the junior national team this summer? Campbell: We are going to select an eight and a coxed four from the sweep camp and a quad from the sculling camp. We are also going to send two pairs and several doubles to trials. My goals for the summer are to run the most efficient, most effective camp I can, to select and prepare the best possible crews for the competition at the world championships and to win medals in at least two of four events.
USRowing: Can you describe the process for athlete selection from the beginning of the summer, up until the world championships? Campbell: We are going to bring 26 sweep oarsmen and 6 coxswains to Mercer Lake for the sweep camp. From that pool, we are going to build an eight and a coxed four, as well as two pairs that will compete at trials for the right to compete at the world championships. The selection process for the eight and the four will follow roughly the same guidelines we have used in the past four years. We do a lot of work in eights and fours, testing combinations and speed over 1,000-meter, 1,250-meter and 1,500-meter intervals. Using this data and some data from direct switches, we will designate an eight and a four that will compete at the world championships. From the remaining athletes, we will select two pairs, which will then race at trials for the right to compete at worlds.
USRowing: You’ve been the boys head coach at Peddie since 2002. Before that, you coached St. Mark’s School, St. Paul’s School and Cincinnati Country Day School. What do you enjoy most about coaching rowing at the high school level? Campbell: Rowing is a sport that rewards investment and effort. Many of the athletes that I have coached are not gifted physical athletes but have been able to compete very successfully at the high school and collegiate levels through determination and hard work. I have always focused on the commitment that athletes need to bring to their work in rowing, and I have always felt most successful when those athletes who are not exceptionally gifted have performed well.
USRowing: What are some of the biggest challenges of coaching at the junior level? Campbell: It is hard to get juniors to understand that their physical and psychological capacities are far greater than they recognize. Tony Johnson, my college coach, always used to challenge us to work beyond what we believed to be our limits. I think this is the greatest challenge with juniors because they are capable of far greater efforts and far stronger performances than many of them realize. Another challenge is training. High school students are very busy. They have a great deal on their plates, and training properly takes more time, energy, and discipline than many of them want to recognize or are prepared to commit.
Courtesy of USRowing
Saturday Afternoon Jog 4/11
Introducing the Old Niskayuna Loop
Meet outside the main entrance of Van Antwerp MS at 2:30pm
Distance: 5.1 miles
Meet outside the main entrance of Van Antwerp MS at 2:30pm
Distance: 5.1 miles
Thursday, April 9, 2009
The Coach/Athlete Relationship
This verges on the cliche, but it will help clarify for many of you what the relationship between an athlete and a coach is really like. You will see the many facets of the job:
NBA player and former University of Michigan star Jalen Rose attributed much of his success to his high school coach, Perry Watson. "He was more than just a basketball coach. He was my counselor. Any time I'd want to talk, just gain knowledge, I'd take my lunch down to his office and talk, and find out about guys that made it, and guys that didn't, and what I could do to make it."
Mary Scotvold, skating coach to Olympic medalists Nancy Kerrigan and Paul Wylie, said that although you send athletes home at the end of the day, coaching is really a 24-hour-a-day job because you spend your time away from them thinking about ways to help them improve.
According to Georgetown University basketball coach John Thompson, "As a coach, you get involved in the background and the personal lives of your players and you have to be able to deal with more than just what is going on on the court. You have to deal with it. We as coaches are just more aware of what's going on."
Mamie Rallins, a four-time world record holder in the hurdles and a member of the 1968 and 1972 U.S. Olympic teams, described her job as track coach at Ohio State University: "When I coach and recruit for this university, I always try to tell my athletes that I will coach you as if you were coming to a finishing school. When I get through with you, you will know how to dress, eat, do anything else in the world that you want to do."
Runner Michael Johnson, winner of two gold medals at the 1996 Atlanta Olympics, has been with his coach, Clyde Hart, since his days as an undergraduate at Baylor University: "Some people try to find a mentor who will provide everything for them: counseling, companionship, guidance, and discipline. That is too taxing a demand for you and for your mentor. A good mentor--like Coach Hart--offers directions and driving tips from the back seat. You still have to drive the car."
Mike Kennan, former coach of the NHL New York Rangers (the team won the Stanley Cup under his direction) and now with the Vancouver Canucks, talked about his coaching style: "I never had the desire to be liked by everybody. My responsibility is to determine the best abilities a player has and can give me. To do that, it's not necessary to be liked. It's necessary to be respected. Making the choice was not hard for me."
Davin Williams is a three-time Idaho high school state champion in the triple jump. Since eighth grade he has been coached on a volunteer basis by Gerald Bell, a junior high school assistant principal who was a triple jumper at Boise State University. Williams works with him on Sundays. ''He's more than my coach. He's my friend. I can talk to him about anything. He's there. He'll always be there.''
NBA player and former University of Michigan star Jalen Rose attributed much of his success to his high school coach, Perry Watson. "He was more than just a basketball coach. He was my counselor. Any time I'd want to talk, just gain knowledge, I'd take my lunch down to his office and talk, and find out about guys that made it, and guys that didn't, and what I could do to make it."
Mary Scotvold, skating coach to Olympic medalists Nancy Kerrigan and Paul Wylie, said that although you send athletes home at the end of the day, coaching is really a 24-hour-a-day job because you spend your time away from them thinking about ways to help them improve.
According to Georgetown University basketball coach John Thompson, "As a coach, you get involved in the background and the personal lives of your players and you have to be able to deal with more than just what is going on on the court. You have to deal with it. We as coaches are just more aware of what's going on."
Mamie Rallins, a four-time world record holder in the hurdles and a member of the 1968 and 1972 U.S. Olympic teams, described her job as track coach at Ohio State University: "When I coach and recruit for this university, I always try to tell my athletes that I will coach you as if you were coming to a finishing school. When I get through with you, you will know how to dress, eat, do anything else in the world that you want to do."
Runner Michael Johnson, winner of two gold medals at the 1996 Atlanta Olympics, has been with his coach, Clyde Hart, since his days as an undergraduate at Baylor University: "Some people try to find a mentor who will provide everything for them: counseling, companionship, guidance, and discipline. That is too taxing a demand for you and for your mentor. A good mentor--like Coach Hart--offers directions and driving tips from the back seat. You still have to drive the car."
Mike Kennan, former coach of the NHL New York Rangers (the team won the Stanley Cup under his direction) and now with the Vancouver Canucks, talked about his coaching style: "I never had the desire to be liked by everybody. My responsibility is to determine the best abilities a player has and can give me. To do that, it's not necessary to be liked. It's necessary to be respected. Making the choice was not hard for me."
Davin Williams is a three-time Idaho high school state champion in the triple jump. Since eighth grade he has been coached on a volunteer basis by Gerald Bell, a junior high school assistant principal who was a triple jumper at Boise State University. Williams works with him on Sundays. ''He's more than my coach. He's my friend. I can talk to him about anything. He's there. He'll always be there.''
Sunday, April 5, 2009
Quick Blades in the Water
Don't get caught up in the race and the commentary. Instead, focus solely on the catches of all the crews.
Germany, in the nearest lane has some outstanding entries at the catch. Look at how quickly the blades go into the water, every blade submerged to the proper depth.
On the closeups, pay attention to the arms and hands of each rower. They are actively raising their hands to ensure a secure catch and connected drive. Furthermore, they are raising their hands as they are coming up the slide at the end of the recovery.
Courtesy of Row2k
Germany, in the nearest lane has some outstanding entries at the catch. Look at how quickly the blades go into the water, every blade submerged to the proper depth.
On the closeups, pay attention to the arms and hands of each rower. They are actively raising their hands to ensure a secure catch and connected drive. Furthermore, they are raising their hands as they are coming up the slide at the end of the recovery.
Courtesy of Row2k
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