30 Years.

Frenchwoman Jeannie Longo first won a national cycling title 30 years ago.

Why is that important?

Because today she won her 56th title at the age of fifty.

I had the fortune of watching Longo race at the Mt. Hood Cycling Classic last year. She's an inspiration to anyone who hopes to remain fit regardless of age, to be competitive regardless of the numbers of years that have passed. I'm in awe.

Grip

Went for another nice row with Max this morning-- a perfect way to start the day. About 65 degrees, sunny, very little wind, just pushing the boat along. It's been a long time since I rowed on even a semi-regular schedule. I'm realizing it's healthy to reconnect with my own skills in the sport as a basis for how to talk to the team about their rowing.

Today I was playing a bit with my grip on the blade. A strong hang on the drive and a light, easy carry up the recovery is the hallmark of good grip. I started to get several strokes again today where I could feel the water touch the blade on the recovery but had no disturbance in the run; good stuff. I still need to do quite a bit to get the finish cleaned up; not the best part of my stroke right now.

Were I coaching myself, I'd say: "Self, you have excellent connection on the front end. However, you're lifting water as you turn the blade a little early during the extraction. Concentrate on holding the release against the footboard and pushing the blade out of the water square."

So that's what I'll work on next time.

Quote of the Day

"The goal in the end is to row fast, which does not necessarily mean nice."
- Hartmut Buschbacher, US National Team Coach 1995

Guest Coaching

Tuesday and Thursday this week I took on a guest coach role for the Station L rowing club masters men. Peter, their coach, is a past L&C coach and alum and good friend of our program; it was a pleasure to fill in while he was out of town.

The role of guest coach is always interesting. You have two days to work with an established group and try to help them reach their goals in a short time. For these guys in particular the masters regional championships is just a week away; minor technical changes probably are not the answer to helping them find more speed. Instead I worked with them a bit on their competition psychology and how to approach their racing.

Today they did some pieces against the masters women from the same club. One of the primary things we worked on was relating to the fastest crews-- making the choice not just to race the crew closest to you, but to race the crew that is pushing for the lead. I think they made some solid strides with that concept and I got to watch some fun racing. Good times all around.

On another note, on Tuesday we launched with the downtown seawall looking the same as it usually does. By the time we had returned, this guy had shown up. Not something we normally see in downtown Portland. I can testify from up-close examination that this ship is LARGE.

Nifty. . .

I actually went for a row this morning; Max & I took out one of the Lewis & Clark doubles and did a short spin up behind the Island and back. It's been a while since I was out in a boat and it was nice to be out there; now everything is sore and lots of new (old?) muscles got recruited.

I was playing around during the row with this;


That's right-- a speedcoach app for the iPhone. With the phone safe it a waterproof case, we got strokerate, splits, and distance for the whole practice. Very nifty. My understanding is that there's going to be an update soon for a 'coach mode' which will be handy for running practice from the launch. I'm stoaked.

Check out the map from our row today!

My geekdom knows no bounds.

A Fit of Tidy

I read a story once about the captain of a large merchant ship. This captain used to let paperwork pile up on his desk until the ship hit a large enough wave. At that point all the papers would slide onto the floor, and he knew it was time to deal with them. As he picked up the floor, he'd deal with each issue. What he found was that if the ship went long enough without encountering major weather he could safely throw most of the paperwork away.

I come from a similar school of thought. Today was my version of rough weather: when I got to the office it had, at some point in the night, passed beyond my acceptable level of clean. I spent a semi-frenzied hour tidying up; what emerged feels much more comfortable and I identified several new (old?) projects in the process.

One thing I think I'm going to move forward on is a paper-free recruiting scheme. Resolution to self: from here on out all contacts with perspective rowers are going to be via web, e-mail, and phone. Why? The amount of postage, paper, and effort saved over the course of multiple years is huge. I couldn't believe how many envelopes, boxes of letterhead, extra letters, and old fliers I dealt with today. I trust current high school students are savvy enough to get information from us electronically.