5 dos and don’ts for. crew alignment… when to coach the whole crew versus coach one individual.
Timestamps
01:00 When in a mixed ability crew it can be challenging, especially if you think you’re the least experienced. Working on one thing for the whole crew at the same time created common endeavour in the boat. Whole crew coaching creates a singular focus. Five situations where there’s an advantage of picking whole crew or individual coaching.
03:30 Warming up
We all do this every practice – the outcome we want is to refresh our memory of the movement and to be warm enough to do the workout. I need the warmup to activate muscles and get into the rowing stroke pattern. This is best done with a coaching focus on the whole crew.
Focus points – these help each person to check their own movement and technique in one area of the stroke. It brings everyone together in one point of the stroke cycle and creates alignment. Try using these in your next workout. First create a common understanding of the static positions in the rowing stroke.
07:30 Drills – learning
When doing them for the first time, it’s important this is done by the whole crew, practicing together. Do the drill 3 times in a workout so the crew learns it fully and is confident executing it.
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10:15 Drills – repeating
You already know how to do the drill this is the moment to move to an individual focus. Are we all moving in the same way? Check they are doing the drill correctly, that they are moving in time with the rest of the crew.
Tell the crew how to make the change, not just the change you want made. This can help everyone to do the movement in the same way. Example how to get blades closer to the water before the catch. For regular crews, you may already had agreed how to do a drill or movement – so this may not be needed.
13:30 Pieces
This is a whole crew focus situation where a common mental focus is needed and helps the piece to be executed better. A call to focus on one part of the stroke is good as the crew all does it together. Keep 10 strokes between every focus call, ensure the crew had done the focus you called. It’s the only thing the crew is trying to do together. Exception is to call it a second time if the crew doesn’t do the change you called.
15:30 Moving from a drill to a piece
Take a technical focus into a hard work piece is an opportunity for individual focus. It’s harder to do the change when you are under pressure, in a more challenging situation. This helps create more alignment in the crew.
Talk about what happens after the workout – did the changes work? Was it more effective to do individual or crew coaching?
