Rowing Faster

by Volker Nolte

Get a length up on the competition with cutting-edge technique, training, and racing information. Let the top rowing coaches and scientists in the world steer you to ultimate success, starting with sound training and racing principles and adding increasingly advanced instruction, drills, and insights all the way to the finish. Rowing Faster is the most comprehensive and detailed guide for achieving excellence in the sport. Inside you'll find the following
-Techniques, drills, and progressions used by World and Olympic champions to master every phase of the stroke -Tests to assess your rowing fitness and workouts to develop an aerobic base, increase anaerobic threshold, improve VO2max, and build rowing-specific strength and power -A rowing periodization plan to sequence all the training components into a complete training program to maximize boat speed for 1000 meters, 2000 meters, and head racing -Racing plans and tactics that have been proven successful at the highest levels of competitionCut through the water faster than ever. Rowing Faster will boost your speed and performance to the highest level.

Genres: Nonfiction, Reference, Fitness

304 pages, Paperback

First published October 1, 2004

Reviews

[Clif Brittain · Rating 3 out of 5]

I am writing this review of the first edition, which I read over a year ago. It is substantially different than the second edition, which I recently read. The first edition is more practical, the second is more philosophical. The first four chapters are more philosophical. The first nine chapters deal with training.

Chapter 5 is "Developing an Aerobic Base" by Marty Aiken. It is written for the level of a national coach with a national budget. If you don't have an Eppendorf lactate analyzer, this chapter will mean less to you. Also helpful will be a portable VO2 analyzer and a budget to equip a team for foreign travel to cross-country ski and bicycle. But if you have the equipment, this chapter is for you. Otherwise, find another book about an aerobic base.

Chapter 6 is "Improving Anaerobic Threshold". Again, you're going to need some way to calculate lactic acid build-up in real time. There is a good discussion about what it means and its relation to VO2 max, but not much use if you don't have the data for yourself or your athletes. The only thing that brings this chapter back to the real world is the mention of using an erg to do a standardized test and comparing the results over time. Well, duh! No mention of what tests or how to evaluate them in terms of anaerobic threshold.

Chapter 7 is "Sprinting and Speed Work" by Declan Connolly. This chapter was more practical (and his Heart Rate Training is even more useful). He has a more graphic and intuitive approach to training and is more easily grasped by the athlete without technical training. He gives examples of how to develop an interval training workout and how to integrate this into your regime.

Chapter 8 deals with weight training, "Building Strength" by Ed McNeely, also more practical. I followed this for a while, but my spine (the doc tells me I have the spine of a man 20 years older) is just not up to maximal lifting. I had to give this up.

Chapter 9, "Designing Your Training Plan" is also by McNeely and is very helpful. McNeely also contributed at least one chapter to the 2nd edition.

Part II is about Technique, which I found to be the most helpful part of the book, probably the best part of both editions. Best in the sense that it has helped me to understand rowing and improve my technique. That said, it was more descriptive than proscriptive. I really want to understand how to take the information and use it, not spend my time deciphering complicated vector diagrams.

Chapter 10, "Rowing Biomechanics" deals a lot with the oar moving through the water and the various forces that create or defeat boat speed. Lots of technical stuff, much of which is counterintuitive, so helpful in really understanding what is going on outside the hull. A very short part of the chapter is about boat velocity, which I've heard discussed many times, but never completely understood. I can't say I completely understand it now, but these paragraphs and one graph I found very useful. The practical advice here can be condensed into "On the recovery, move the little, light parts first. Save the movement of the big parts until last."

Chapter 11 "Rigging" provides a very good and concise discussion of the variables that can be manipulated to improve or customize the rigging of a boat. The chapter was written by Nolte, the editor of the book. I wish the other chapters had as much practical applications as his chapter. This chapter has two tables that I find particularly helpful. One has standards and deviations for various types of boats. It has a discussion and examples of why you'd want to use the variations. He also provides a framework for testing the changes. The second table is a procedure for making the changes. Just making changes in random order would be less helpful than making no changes. If you have control over the rigging of a boat, this is a great chapter. If you don't have control over a boat, don't try to effect changes for only your seat. You'll only mess up the boat. If you are of non-average size, I think this is a great resource to help find what adjustments will make the most difference for you.

Chapter 12, "Bladework" is for me another good "Goldilocks" chapter. Not too much, not too little, not too technical, not too basic. The author, Mike Spracklen, talks about how blade work has been neglected, largely because beginners start in such difficult boats and develop bad habits that are difficult to break. This is true of me and every one of my friends who learned to row as adults. Coaches seem to hate to coach masters and unbreakable habits are one of the reasons. There is a good discussion of what happens when bladework is good and when it is bad. There are also drills, many of which were unfamiliar to me. I look forward to trying them. A very good chapter.

Chapter 13, “The Catch” is another good chapter. I really look forward to being on the water again to work on some of these suggestions. The author, Brian Richardson, does a great job of explaining how the recovery is related to the catch. Actually, he says the catch is part of the recovery and the drive does not begin until the blade is squared and buried. Most notably he explains how vital the timing of the catch is to not stopping the run of the boat. “If the blade is not locked in the water or is driving in the air, power applied to the blade through the footplate transferred by the handle affects boat propulsion negatively.” What this sentence has led me to understand is that all the (awesome!?) power released when the drive begins while my blades are waving around in the air is propelling the boat backwards. When the blades finally enter the water, they have to recreate the momentum that was lost. It is as if I was swimming a forward crawl and instead of cupping my hands and slicing them into the water, I was opening my palm and pushing it into the water before I began my stroke.

[Susan]

shout out erik for sharing the wealth

[Jüri-Mikk · Rating 4 out of 5]

[1st edition] I think it's a good book to read for any rower/coach, as it will add different perspectives from world class rowing coaches, physiologists, and researchers. Some of the chapters might be outdated and some other (imo) not really applicable for good rowing or coaching (e.g. "Inside the rower's mind"), but overall the book has plenty of useful thoughts. Personally, some of the more interesting chapters included aerobic and anaerobic conditioning; thoughts by Mike Spracklen, Richard Tonks, and Mike Teti; designing a training plan, and finally relaxing and focusing for performance.

[Greg]

This book is really intended for coaches. It's a series of short papers on various topics about rowing and competition. Some were directly applicable, some would have been applicable except they were too general to be meaningful, and some are expressly about coaching concerns like designing seat-racing charts for boat selection.

[cellomerl · Rating 1 out of 5]

I was excited about reading this book, but it was very disappointing - it was not just colossally boring, but also did not add much to the body of knowledge. The technical stuff was dry as sand, presupposed that the reader understands a lot of jargon, and had no diagrams or photos. The nutrition stuff was based on the conventional low-fat high-carb dogma that is thirty years out of date and completely wrong. Most of the rest of it was poorly written sociological gobbledygook that often skated away from relevance and used ten words where three would do. There were one or two gems (mostly anecdotes about racing from former world champion rowers) and some interesting stories about rowing history, but I skimmed 90% of this book and actually skipped a lot of the pages.

[Bas Kreuger · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very good book by default........... Because there isn't much to compare it with.
That said, there is more than enough valuable information in the book, although the articles are written by several authors and not all of them are good writers or have written interesting articles.
Still, a number of articles are very valuable for both rowers and/or coaches because they delve deeper into technique, rigging, training programs, mental coaching and several other subjects you will have to hunt for on the internet otherwise.

[Edward Kidder · Rating 3 out of 5]

This collection of essays had some helpful insights for this novice masters rower. It also has some over-the-top techniques for enhancing performance in elite collegiate rowing. Checking blood lactic acid levels while in the boat? No thanks. But how to improve the catch and other basic technique studies were helpful.

[Sarah · Rating 3 out of 5]

I like this in a nerdy interested-in-how-things-work way, but am glad I didn't read it when I was a beginning rower. The advice isn't so practical, though there are lessons and drills I will take into my coaching of novices next year...

[Anne · Rating 3 out of 5]

Some inspired formulations about what's involved at the catch, for example, but some of the chapters made me feel stupid. Do I really have to be a physicist to understand an explanation of the water dynamics of an oar going through the water?

[Ian · Rating 4 out of 5]

Difficult to imagine a better attempt at comprehensive coverage of the major aspects of rowing for coaches and experienced athletes. This is probably about as good as a sports science book can be, in terms of readability and information density.

[Phil Hulse · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent counsel in technique

[Emily Farrar · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great book!! Great information in it, that even helped lower my 2k split down to a personnal best despite the fact that I was sick!!!

[Evans · Rating 5 out of 5]

Like any favorite book, this improves with each reading. A necessary reference.

[Katie · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book was FULL of useful information, and because of that, it was definitely a "slow down to take it all in" kind of read.

[Alan · Rating 3 out of 5]

Very technical.