There is also another factor to be taken into calculation by the trainer, and that is whether, at the time when sharp work is necessary to produce condition, his crew are sufficiently advanced as oarsmen to justify him in setting them to perform that work at a fast stroke in the boat. Not all crews require to be worked upon the same system, irrespective of the question of stamina and health.
Suppose a crew are backward as oarsmen and also behindhand in condition. If such a crew are set to row a fast stroke in order to blow themselves and to accustom their vascular system to high pressure, their style may be damaged. If on the other hand they do no work except rowing at a slow stroke until within a few days of the race, they will come to the post short of condition. Such a crew should be kept at a slow stroke in the boat, in order to enable them to learn style, for a fortnight or so; but meantime the trainer should put them through some sharp work upon their legs. He should set them to run a mile or so after the day’s rowing. This will get off flesh, and will clear the wind, and meantime style can be studied in the boat. Long rows without an easy are a mistake for backward men who are also short of work. When the pupil gets blown at the end of a few minutes he relapses into his old faults, and makes his last state worse than the first.
‘RUN A MILE OR TWO.’
Training not only gets off superfluous flesh, but also lays on muscle. The sooner the fat is off the sooner does the muscle lay on. The commissariat feeds the newly developing muscles better if there is no tax upon it to replenish the fat as well. For this reason, apart from the importance of clearing the wind, heavy work should come early in training. When a crew who have been considerably reduced in weight early in their course of training, feed up towards the last, and gain in weight, it is a good sign, and shows that their labours have been judiciously adjusted; the weight which they pick up at the close of training is new muscle replacing the discarded fat.
In training college eights for summer races there is not scope for training on the above system. The time is too short, some of the men are already half-fit, and have been in work of some sort or other during the spring; while one or two of them may have been lying idle for a twelvemonth. In such cases a captain must use his own discretion; he can set his grosser men to do some running while he confines those who are fitter to work only in the ship. As a rule, however, unless men have no surplus flesh to take off, all oarsmen are the better for a little running at the end of the day during the early part of training. It prepares their wind for the time when a quick stroke will be required of them. A crew who have been rowing a slow stroke and who have meantime been improved in condition by running, will take to the quick stroke later on more kindly than a ditto class crew who have done no running, and whose condition has been obtained only by rowing exercise. The latter crew have been rowing all abroad while short of wind, and have thereby not corrected, and probably have contracted, faults. The former crew will have had better opportunities of improving their style, will be more like machinery, and will be less blown when they are at last asked to gallop in the boat.
For the first few days it will be well to row an untrained crew over easy half-miles. A long day’s work in the boat will not harm them: on the contrary, it will tend to shake them together; tired men can row well as to style, but men out of breath cannot row. At the end of a week or so, the men can cover a mile at a hard slow grind without an easy. If there is plenty of time, i.e. some five weeks of training, a good deal of paddling can be done, alternating with hard rowing at a slow stroke. If there are only three weeks to train, and men are gross, much paddling cannot be spared. If again time is short and men have already been in work for other races, and do not want much if any reduction in weight, then a good deal of the day’s work may be done at a paddle.