One of the things I really struggled with in the first few sessions was the whole “clearing your mind” thing. It seemed that every few seconds my brain would flit off in random directions and I’d start thinking about

• doing laundry
• buying food (standard)
• cleaning my bike
• wondering why I keep my bike cleaning stuff next to my pile of fruit
• the need to hoover the carpet
• the need to remove the really quite obvious chain oil stain from said carpet before the college housekeeping department notices and I get fined

You get the idea. Listening to Radio 4 wasn’t much better either, as good as the Today program is.  However **handy tip** I coined on to counting breaths and seeing how deep and slow I could do that.  This was weirdly calming, increased my focus quite a lot and made me more in control of my breathing.  As a result, some of the previously painful poses are now actually relaxing.

I’m currently in between rowing seasons and am a small break from rowing (I’ve been BANNED from rowing. Or erging. It’s very upsetting).  This, and being out of term time, has meant I’ve had a bit of time to try this yoga thing properly, so I’m trying to do it once or twice a day.  The circuit suggested in the book takes 20-30mins depending on how stiff I am or how much I need to check what I’m doing.

I suppose you want a hamstring check:

Hamstrings status on 26 August

I think that counts as success!  [to compare last week's hamstrings see the Yoga for Rowers review]. I’ve given up drawing lines on the photo – sorry.  It wasn’t very scientific anyway as it was just me trying to draw a yellow line on a photo in Paint then measuring the angle with a protractor (seriously!) on the screen.  There’s a “sit and reach” thing in the gym I go to – might use that weekly for something a bit more quantifiable.

I’ve also noticed that I’m inadvertently showcasing my bike collection to you (there are only so many places you can fit two bikes in your room).  That chrome, shiny thing behind me is my Bianchi known as The Bianchi.  Second in importance and engineering beautiful-ness only to The Empacher.  Here I feel duty bound to say that if you like having money, you should probably not get into cycling.

Equipment requirements for rowing: Boat (can be borrowed), blades (ditto), lycra (buy your own! Eww!), rigger jigger (most likely stolen).

Equipment requirements for cycling: Bike (at least one, though you’ll eventually end up with a “best” road bike, a winter bike, a time trial bike, a fixed gear and a “round town” bike. And another that was a “complete 100% bargain” on Wiggle just for the hell of it), pedals, cleats, shoes, shoe covers because otherwise you’ll lose your toes in winter, helmet, bib shorts, jersey, summer gloves, winter gloves, waterproof gloves, speedometer, lights, new tyres every c.3000 miles or when you cycle over broken glass and shred yours (:-s), bottle cages **BREATHES** bike pumps (floor and a little hand one for emergencies), spare inner tubes, tyre levers, various lubricants, spanners, allan keys, a chain whip (if you’ve gone down the fixie route), different sprockets because you can’t decide what gearing you like (ditto fixed gear), mudguards for winter, turbo trainer for when it’s snowing ANNNNNNNNND you get the idea.

You know what’s the worst bit?  I bought that bike because I didn’t want to keep paying for the Cambridge-Ely train to get to rowing. “It’ll pay for itself” I reasoned.  Ha. Ha. Ha. However, I suppose it’s better to have something nice and shiny to show for your money instead of a sizeable stack of train tickets and a bank statement with endless £5.50 debits to “National Express East Anglia”. (£5.50. To go 15 miles up the road. At 5:55am. *Shakes head in disgust*).

Oh dear. I’ve got distracted and have written half a page about cycling.  On a rowing/yoga blog.  Hmmm. GET BACK ON TRACK RAILTON.

Ooo! Ooo! I was good and got a book on yoga out of the library, mainly to see if it could teach me how to do awesome party-trick poses (it can!).  I found this, which I thought was quite amusing:

Yoga relaxation pose

This is the *second* double page spread explaining how to do the “Savasana” or corpse pose, which is pretty much just lying on the floor and relaxing everything.  Just like sleeping. Riiiiight.

• Days till I can go rowing: 9
• Days till October trials: 56
• Can put legs behind head? No

Interesting Astrophysical fact of the week: A photon created at the centre of the sun takes 170000 years to reach the surface (then 8 mins to reach earth). That. Is. Awesome.

Lesson of the week: Never underestimate an old guy on a bike. Slack off for a second and they’ll be a speck in the distance.

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I thought yoga would be a good thing for me to try as (1) I’m *really* not very flexible (see below), (2) I’m fairly uncoordinated and (3) I’m a pretty rage-filled person and it might help me chill out a bit.

Me a lot of the time. Only with less swords and no dead Persians.

Party Trick?

I also think it would be quite neat to be able to do this as some sort of uber-flexible party trick:

First Impressions

This is certainly not a weighty tome (it’s 65 pages long), so I’d go for the e-book option as you might feel a little hard-done by after buying the paper copy and paying for P&P.

Besides this, I was reassured to find that it doesn’t mention re-aligning Chakras or anything like that, because to be honest, I’m not going to buy into that any time soon. In fact, it says

“And you don’t have to trade in your JL wardrobe for hemp clothing or become a vegan either”,

Which is probably a good thing as that would mean getting rid of half my clothes…

The book is organised into 4 sections – the Recovery, the Catch, the Power phase and the Finish, with 3 positions for each.  It suggests to do all of these every day for at least a month, which I’m happy to commit to.

Getting down to it

So you can see if there’s any progress in my flexibility, I thought I’d include a photo of how long my hamstrings are every time I update the blog (I can’t think of any other measure I’m afraid…). With no yoga:

Me with no yoga in my life

Excuse the socks

So, rather embarrassingly, can’t even get into a right angle.  Hmm. Definitely room for improvement there.

My first complete yoga for rowers session

It took 45mins to get through it first time round, but that was with lots of reading and re-reading and falling over.  How on earth you’re supposed to think about clearing your head and thinking about your breathing while trying to contort yourself into positions that NO NORMAL PERSON CAN DO is beyond me.

However, I will stick with it and let you know how I get on with it.

Anna Railton, Rob Roy Boat Club and CUWBC

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Rowperfect RP3

Rowperfect UK is pleased to announce that the new Rowperfect rowing machine is now available for sale in the UK.

Casper Rekers, the Dutch inventor, has improved the design and remodelled the unit adding in new software, improved resistance adjustment and building it in robust stainless steel.

You can see photos of the new RP3 here the specifications and brochure.

We are placing our first order NOW for delivery around 20th September (in time for your pre-season training camp) and would like to know if your club wants some set aside for them?

The RP3 base unit and computer interface retails for £1,770 including VAT. Details here

Let us know if you want your existing RPs (and Concept2s) serviced before term begins as well.  We will visit any UK or Ireland club.

Call if you want more information and speak to Nic Bourne, our UK manager on 07939 584140.

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If you have one and want to sell it, please get in touch.

Prices depend on the condition, recency of service of your RP:

• Good condition base unit £500 – Less good condition from £300 – 400
• Interface, cable and Windows software £100
• Interface, cable and DOS software £50

If you would like us to service your RP it costs £85 plus parts.

Upgrade your DOS interface to Windows software it costs £95 plus postage.

A new Rowperfect interface cable costs £15 plus postage

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Any customers wanting to save money on our shop products can get FREE SHIPPING by collecting from our stand.

If you want to save shipping and IF we have the product in stock; buy your goods on our shop and when you get to the checkout insert the discount code SHIPFREE at step 2 of the checkout and you won’t be charged. [Note: this is case sensitive and no spaces]. Then all you have to do is come and find us at the regatta.

If you don’t collect your goods; we will charge you extra for mailing them.

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They are on training camp in Lake Samish, Bellingham, Washington State and are practicing for the US selection regatta.  Carlos has an audacious plan for the double to join Kristin Hedstrom, and Victoria Burke and make a LW4x as a second crew.  That combination has yet to be selected and will go to trials

Each crew has started a blog to record their progress – this week they’ve been getting visitors at the camp including Erik Miller, Kristen’s former coach and Guenter the “Crazy German”.  The quad’s blog is called Bellingham Quad and the double’s is RowStarProject.

Have a look at their newly painted mailbox…

Carlos’ quote for the day

No shuttle like a grandmother

Meanwhile, the rest of the heavyweight US crews are trialling in the third selection regatta.

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1. There is No box
2. There are NO spare elastics supplied
3. All MK1 have medium elastics supplied
4. Rowperfect UK will supply replacement elastics to you free of charge if yours break – just ask

Rowperfect UK has some spare elastics of different tensions which we would be pleased to supply to you if you find the medium tension elastics which come with the MK1 oarlocks are not to your liking.  Please ask, we’ll post them to you free of charge.

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It is a search engine for tweets – so if you are looking to connect with other people who row or scull or crew, then you can do it on the site.

The main feature we like is “experts” as it checks within tweets to find your specified search term – here are the people who use the word ‘rowperfect’ in their tweets – it says their Twitter name, how they describe themselves and the number of times the search term has been mentioned.

Neat eh?

Twitter search using Topsy for rowing experts

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Dr Scott Turner makes some good points:

1. Thrust is intermittent and during a competitive race the loss of speed [on the recovery] can spell the difference between winning and losing (2:18)
2. The boat forward speed is maintained or even increased during the return stroke [recovery] by the movement of the athlete’s body (5:35)
3. The combined momentum of an 8 person crew only works to increase the speed of the hull if the movements of the team are strongly synchronised (7:35)
4. This synchronisation is the job of the coxswain.  Although she is effectively parasite weight and contributes no power, ensuring the rowers remain co-ordinated pays for itself ensuring the best momentum recovery during the return stroke. (7:50)

If you are concerned with any or all of these ways to improve your boat speed you may want to consider the following products to assist you with the four points above.

1. Coxmate SX to see average speed over each stroke cycle
2. Coxmate SX impeller with analysis software to see speed changes during the recovery and Rowperfects linked together to co-ordinate body movements in the recovery
3. Rowperfects linked together to co-ordinate body movements
4. Coxswain audio guide to hear what top coxes say to their crews during races

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Ian Roots of Mortlake Anglian and Alpha Rowing Club.

Rob Jephcote of Burton Leander Rowing Club

Mark Shimmin and his son tried out the RP3.  [thanks Tom for naming & shaming!]

Pauline McGovan of Strathclyde Park Rowing Club

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