row2k Features
Sooo, They Talked You Into Coxing...
July 7, 2000
Rob Colburn

Summer is club and masters' rowing season, and suddenly there seem to be more boats than there are coxswains. We're desperately short of short people, experienced or not. Perhaps an older sibling talked you into coxing. Perhaps you are a rower who agreed to "take one for the boat" and you got pressed into it. Perhaps a friend of yours at work rows; or you were innocently walking along the bank of the river one evening and stopped to watch a shell prepping to launch. Someone looked up and saw you and yelled, "Hey! We need a coxswain. Can you cox for us this weekend?" It looked every bit as beautiful as Eakins painted it, and in a moment of weakness you said "Sure." They told you it "was just for fun;" and that there was "really nothing to it; you just pull on this rope," and that someone else would handle all the entry forms.

But did they also tell you that you would be driving something four feet longer than a Greyhound bus -- from the back seat?! Or that the lineup of the boat would be constantly changing, and that you'd be going into your pre-race practice with three substitutes in the boat (and one of them is the Stroke!)? Or that you will be racing boats made up of former Oxford blues and ex-German National Teamers who just happened to be in the country this weekend and decided it would be fun to borrow a boat and enter some regattas?

Welcome to masters and club coxing. If you're brand new to crew, it's a great way to learn. If you are an experienced high school or college coxswain, you'll probably find that coxing at most club and masters programs over the long haul is very different, given sporadic attendance, influx of new members, differing fitness and skill levels, and that you may find yourself shouting down giants of industry whose day job is telling other folks what to do. Practice times may be irregular; you may find yourself coxing composite boats, and -- depending on the size of the program -- you may be coxing many boats in the same regatta. (At my second masters regatta, they entrusted no fewer than six boats to my tender mercies -- Have CoxBox; Will Travel ).

As a way of knowing your boats better -- when lineups are in flux daily -- tuck the boating slips from practices into your sock as soon as the coach hands them to you (this usually guarantees that no one else will ask for them back later), allowing you to make notes after practice: which drills you did, which drills seemed to help, which stroke ratings moved the boat best, etc. Thus, when the lineups switch suddenly, or you find yourself in a race boat which may have practiced together only a handful of times, the slips provide you with information you can refer to for planning strategy.

This is not to imply that club and masters rowing is necessarily haphazard. Far from it. There are many club and masters programs where the training is carried out on a professional (if one may use the that word in connection with crew) intensity, producing nationally and internationally competitive boats. But masters and club rowing has as its goal to involve many people at all levels, from weekend warriors to aspiring as well as former olympians. That is part of what makes it such a special sport -- we get to race our heroes and heroines.

Many masters and club programs operate under the aegis of college and university programs (and here I would like to offer a huge thanks to all the universities who generously make facilities, equipment, and other resources available -- masters rowing could not thrive as it does without that support.) As a club coxswain, you can foster that relationship by carefully handling the shells and equipment entrusted to you.

Effective coxing -- at any level --means tuning yourself to the boat. Club and masters coxing will give ample scope for that attribute. Adaptability is a many-splendoured thing. The people rowing in your boats are juggling many commitments, and they are out on the water from a strong love of the sport. Your willingness to cox presents other people with a precious time in a boat. Never underestimate the value of your contribution.

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