The Perfect Rowing Stroke

The women's rowing team explains the mechanics of the rowing technique.

[tomgulding]

Rowing is where your heart is. The water, the team, every stroke, the pain in your back, the feeling when you finish your training sequence. The relief when you leave the boat, straighten up your back and the wish to do the next trip. That means to me „ perfect stroke“

[coach.herrick]

Great video with isolation on specific parts of the recovery and drive. To all the critics, has there ever been a perfect rower? No. Everyone has things to improve on. 

[tomisthesound]

Hmm if you're going to call it the perfect stroke you're opening yourself up to a lot of criticism.

[tdekoekkoek]

Catches are not good.  Rowing the blade in and not getting buried.  Nice video though.

[dmwhoytx]

Neither the catch nor the release has the blade moving vertical to the water.
Gradual blade entry at the catch has the blad only partially buried the first two feet of pull.  Then they start dropping their hands before the release, washing out before the finish.

Finish is a push, down and away at the point of furthest pull into the body.
Catch is a vertical lift timed at the point of furthest reach.

[animted]

You might be right. I'm a novice rower. But how do we know if any YouTube critic is qualified unless they list their qualifications or post their own videos? The BU woman's rowing team did pretty well in 2012:
March - Claims Kittell Cup at Syracuse
April - Wins Four Races at Saint Joseph's by Open Water
May - 3 medals at Eastern Sprints
July - BU grad wins gold medal at World Rowing Championship
Nov - Four top 10 results, Foot of the Charles
Dec - 2nd Place, Head of the Charles

[markborchelt]

wish I could see more continuous strokes. Boats are down to port a little and allot. Starboard can't get in the water. rowers have good body mechanics. They know how to pull. To improve boat balance try a pause drill that pauses every stroke, 6 inches away from the body. By then you should have changed heights from drive to recovery. If the boat is down to one side the coach can help level the hands and get the balance and fun back in rowing an 8 fast.

[luc]

That blade could be underwater for a longer time tbh. You start driving with the blade half out of the water and you don't finish it either.

[anthonylightening]

They're using their back during their drive

[ToastediPod]

The perfect stroke? 1:15 how much is that boat leaning?!

[chungusbungs]

yeah your technique is pretty good but you are dipping your handle down at the front end resulting in a slow and sloppy catch on some of these strokes. when you tap the hands down at the finish you should maintain that hight throughout the stroke rather than not tapping down enough and then lowering your hands so you can square up. But hey, I'm just a novice so what do I know

[animted]

Wow there sure are a lot of "experts" here giving advice.

[ricekale]

"I puke all the time." was my favorite.

[miguelsolodezaldivar]

strock man loses 15cm of water on each strock

[matthewclarke]

How does complete beginners who have never rowed before get started?

[Sseean]

1:12 legs, body then arms.... Not arms and body at the same time

[johnpyra]

the strokes here are not perfect but continue or your journey.

[garrett]

some of their catches aren't even in time and some of them are putting their blades up really high.

[aaronjones]

You could use your glutes, if you want to bounce the boat and cause check, while wasting energy at the same time...

[scottpatonlevin]

I don't think you should tilt/square your blade too soon, because it creates a slight resistance against the wind. I was taught to to use a technique called "flick square" where you quickly square your blade in a flicking motion just before your catch. 😄