RowingRelated

The calm before the storm at Agganis Arena, Boston (Photo: A. Gutierrez) While the there was no shortage of drama in the men's open final at the 2015 Crash-B Sprints World Indoor Rowing Championship, the deepest field, and most impressive performances overall, came from the junior women. I hesitate to say junior, because, as has seemingly become the norm at Crash-Bs, there was nothing 'junior' about these performances. And while there was one result that absolutely topped them all—the phenomenal 6:30.2 from Greece's Sophia Asoumanaki  (roughly 13 seconds faster than open women's champion  Kaisa Pajusalu of Estonia, who won Crash-Bs for the third time on Sunday)—the field was the deepest in Boston as well, with no fewer than seven women under seven minutes. (Not that we need to let any NCAA recruiters know that stat.)

If you were in Boston over the weekend, you enjoyed quite a show. The 2014 Crash-B Sprints featured one of the deepest men's open fields in recent memory in terms of raw power, and there were equally impressive performances on the women's side.

Agganis Panorama (Photo: © Tom Lynam) The 2013 Crash-B World Indoor Rowing Championships are in the books, and in the midst of many excellent results, three performances stand out from the crowd: first, high school senior Christine Cavallo took top honors in the women's junior lightweight event in a time (7:05.7—a new world record for the event) that would have won the women's open lightweight category, and was eleven seconds off the senior world record set by Ursula Grobler . Meanwhile, in the women's open event, high school senior Ruth Narode took fourth place overall in a very impressive time of 6:52.2. Both Narode and Cavallo are coming off stellar seasons, capped off with silver medal performances at the World Rowing Senior and Junior Championships in Plovdiv, Bulgaria last summer. Not to be outdone, Ryan O'Rourke , representing Lawrenceville School, took first place in the junior men's heavyweight event in a time of 6:02.4 (down from 6:13.8 in his first...

The Dawg Pound after the snow (Photo: B. Kitch) The second issue of the 2012 campaign for Rowing News is on its way. This issue features coverage of the C.R.A.S.H.-B. Sprints, with a series of short interviews with the top performers last Sunday (including Rose City Rowing Club phenom Ruth Narode , outstanding Grand Valley State novice Nate Biolchini , who posted a 6:06.3 despite having started in the sport just five months ago, and two-time Olympian Greg Ruckman , among many others). We also checked in with Danish lightweight world record holder Henrik Stephansen on this plans for 2012, caught up with CRI's Matt Zatorski about the 2012 'What Works' Summit (which featured appearances by Bob Ernst of UW, and German Rowing Federation head coach Hartmut Buschbacher ), and spoke with Boston University's Tom Bohrer about how to develop mid-season racing technique after a winter off the water. Add to this our features on the amazing health benefits of adaptive rowi...

Flood on the podium If you haven't heard the name Greg Flood yet, you will. Soon. Having started rowing as a college freshman at Notre Dame, Flood began his rowing career with a win in the Novice VIII at the ARCA Championship regatta in 2008, and has since racked up hardware of a different, perhaps more utilitarian kind. This past February, Flood won the Collegiate Lightweight division at Crash-B's for the second time in as many years, taking home the hammer in 6:12.8 -- still the fastest time of any US lightweight so far this season. In the U23 category, he placed second, behind only Steffen Jensen of Denmark. Here, Greg talks with RR about how he got started, what motivates him, and where he hopes to go with the sport he has taken to so quickly. RR: How did you get started rowing? What was your athletic background prior to college? GF: I, like many club rowers, took my first strokes when I got to college. However, I had already developed an interest in the sport bef...

I'm still ironing out the kinks in our upcoming RR interview with Jason Read, but it will be published as soon as we nail down the final copy. In addition to our interview with JR, I'm currently at work on another with Greg Flood of Notre Dame, 2010 and 2011 Crash-B Champion in the Collegiate Lightweight division. RowingRelated has been growing, and that is all thanks to you, the reader. In keeping with that idea, we'd like to know more about what you, the reader, would like to see. If you have any comments or suggestions, or there's a particular kind of content you'd like to see more of, send us an email at rowingrelated[at]gmail.com. In the meantime, we hope you've been enjoying the articles and interviews to date, and we're looking forward to all that Spring racing season has to offer. Thanks very much, Bryan and the RR Editorial Staff

This past Sunday marked the 30th annual Crash-B Indoor Rowing World Championships, and there were some very familiar faces mixed in with a host of new ones in Boston. The University of Washington men dominated the Open event, with two elite level finishes from Conlin McCabe (overall winner in 5:48.0) and Hans Struzyna (second place overall in 5:52.6 -- he managed this while standing only 6'2" tall and weighing in at 185 lbs, according to the UW website). Is it just me, or is this maybe a statement about UW's intentions after last year's narrow defeat at the IRA? New York Athletic Club member and World Champion Jamie Koven showed that he still has much rowing ahead of him, crushing the Men's Masters (30-39) event in a time of 5:57 flat. This would be quite an achievement at any age, and is especially outstanding given the constraints his career places on his schedule. Outside of Koven, there was a noticeable lack of current men's US National Team members at...

Smooth sculling on the Schuylkill (Photo: B. Kitch) As I've discussed quite recently, the RR article, 'Why do Rowers Fear the Erg?' has attracted some attention, and was posted to the Rowperfect UK site. This resulted in a number of comments, one of which came from a former international lightweight and world champion from the Netherlands (and inventor of the Rowperfect)  Frans Göbel , MD, who contributed to the discussion by posting a study from the Trinity Centre for Health Sciences, St James’s Hospital, Dublin, Ireland. With this, he included his own comment, "Injuries are related with the amount of work (training) and with ergometer training." I am by no means a former world champion, nor have I rowed as a member of my country's national team, nor am I a doctor. Frans Göbel can boast far more credentials than I, and I have nothing but respect for his accomplishments and opinions. However, I must disagree with this assessment of the data. It means ...

We here at RowingRelated would like to say thanks to everyone who has helped us to get started, even if it meant simply reading an article we've posted to the site. Having started the site just under three months ago (on October 11th , 2010), the hope was that the rowing community, which we feel is both intelligent and extremely dedicated, might appreciate a closer look at many of the things that often get taken for granted, as well as a fresh take on training regimens, technique, and the everyday. So far, we have been humbled to have received over 10,000 visitors (over 2,000 of whom have come from abroad), as well as some great feedback, and we want to say thanks for making our fledgling venture a success thus far. There is much, much more to come in 2011, and we look forward to sharing our opinions, thoughts and ideas with all of you as we begin the new year. I'd like to extend a special thank you to Sean Wolf of Rowing Illustrated, Rebecca Caroe of Rowperfect, everyone at Ro...

Lightweights racing at Crash-Bs in 2012 (Photo: B. Kitch) The junior and collegiate indoor rowing season is just around the corner, and that means sooner or later you are going be testing yourself for 2,000 meters along with your teammates. Whether it's at your club's boathouse, a regional championship, or Crash-Bs, there are a few tips that can help you to achieve your goals this winter. There are as many ways to approach a 2k as there are people rowing, but given my experience the following, simple tricks can put you in the right place when the electronic starting official let's you know it's time to go. 1. Don't worry if you can't sleep. Being nervous is natural, and look at it from the positive standpoint of neurological and physiological preparation: your body and mind are ready to get after it. That's good. The best advice I ever heard regarding sleep was as simple as this: when your body needs sleep, it takes it (I believe this came from Matt Pi...