What do you pay attention to while you row?

There is something to be said for watching or listening to the news (or some other program or music) while you row.  It can be relaxing.  You can accomplish two things at once. Most importantly, it can help pass the time.  If being entertained or educated with something else while you row helps you do your rowing, that is a good thing.

A second approach, paying attention to your rowing, can be equally effective to pass the time.  And it can enable you to get more out of your rowing.  To help you pay closer attention to your rowing, there are many aspects of technique, coordination of your body, and how you apply power to consider.

Technique, Coordination, and Power:  The book offers a number of suggestions to help you improve your technique and get more out of your rowing.  Some suggestions are drills or points to focus on.  You can alternate what you focus on every ten or twenty strokes. Or simply re-focus on a particular technique point when you realize your mind has wandered.

There are additional benefits to focusing your attention on technique while you row. Your rowing will be more comfortable if done correctly. You will also increase your awareness of what your body is doing and what is happening to it. While the back and forth motion looks easy when done correctly, there are as many ways to get it wrong or to do it inefficiently as there are body parts in motion.

One key to making your rowing motion graceful is learning to work the stronger muscles harder while relaxing the smaller ones. Do not engage in unnecessary motion. Coordinate efficiently among muscle groups. Balance the effort of the drive and the relaxation of the recovery.

As you work on your technique, you will find your rowing becomes smoother, more effortless in appearance, and more powerful. You will row harder and get a better workout, while to an observer you appear not to be working as hard as when you first started and your technique was rougher.

And it is always useful to pay attention to your breathing from time to time.  You may feel like you are working hard and yet notice that your breathing is not especially deep.  Learn from that.  It may be a sign that the tired muscles need to grow.  As they grow in strength over time in response to your daily row, you will find you can row hard enough to cause you to breathe deeply without the muscles becoming as fatigued.  Or, your shallow and easy breathing may simply be a sign that you are rowing too easily.  If you do not feel tired and your breathing is light, try pushing down the legs a little more firmly and quickly and see how your breath responds.  One of the nice things about rowing is that the machine responds to you as you row; you do not have to adjust settings to modify your pace.

Here are some of the topics discussed further in the book:

• The First Lesson: Relaxed Hands
• Row with Relaxed Shoulders
• Leg Symmetry: Use Both Legs Fully and Evenly
• Posture: Make Room for the Lungs
• Combining the Body with the Arms: The Lats
• Coordination of Back and Legs
• Long and Easy for Fitness
• Use Short Intense Intervals to “Up the Ante”
• Vary the Stroke Rating
• Work on Ratio
• Vary the Slide, the Distance You Drive the Legs
• Finish Strong

Keeping a log of your exercise will complement your paying attention while you row.  You will find yourself wanting to record certain information about your row.  So you will pay attention to those types of things – how you felt generally, whether your arms felt as tired, how a particular drill went, whether that blister on your heel bothered you, what your breathing felt like when you were working hard and how you handled it as you eased off.  Of course, you can also record that you rowed a certain time or distance, but you may find that your subjective observations are equally or more useful to you.

See what works for you.