It All Starts with the Hands
I wish that some coach, somewhere along the line in my 50 years plus, had started me with the hands. But no one did, nor do they now.
It's a fact that most beginners are not taught correct hand position and suffer from this lack for years until they finally get it right - by seeing a video of one of our sport's greats, or hearing from one of the very few coaches who stress this vital matter.
The hands must grip the oar with full palm involvement all through the drive - forget the nonsense about holding a sword lightly but firmly. The grip must be full - so that water will always run down toward the knuckles from the wrist joint. For scullers, you should be able to see your fingernails all during the drive. For sweepers, be sure their wrist is held slightly cocked during the drive.
Why do this? Here's the logic. The full palm grip is stronger, it feels stronger and it is. But beside this the proper grip does much more to the rest of the drive.
First, it insures that the forearm and elbow are high, following the plane of the arc and not below it. Second, the full palm grip creates a perfect finish - as the oar handle approaches the body, the arms finish their work, the elbows drop naturally and the oar is extracted by the simple straightening of the wrists.
Then on the recovery, the full palm grip helps the rower make a firm, quick and early roll up; after the oar handle reaches the toes, the oar should already be squared and the wrists in the cocked position, ready to drop the oar into the water.
What goes wrong? Most beginners and novices believe that the longer the finish the better, and helped by a loose and "finger" grip, they keep pulling until the oar hits the body or the clothing and the finish becomes a dragging mess. Contrast this with the full palm finish - as the handle approaches the body, the rower should be thinking only of dropping the hands and elbows - the drive is finished, the thought should be "get rid of it" and at the tip of the hip, the oar exits cleanly as the wrists straighten onto the feather.
Learning the full palm grip is not easy. Start with the simple statement many times made by Capital Rowing Club's great coach Elena Bratichko "You control the oar - it does not control you."
Then there are a few hurdles to get over. First is fear. The main reason that most rowers square late, "flip" catch and miss a proper square, descending catch is fear - fear of hitting the water with a square blade, fear that the handle my jerk out of the "soft" grip that most employ.
Learning to row square blade is the answer. Most rowers hate it, but it is necessary and an aid to carrying the hands correctly. Try to row 100 strokes on the square every sculling outing, until you are convinced that hitting the water squared is no different than hitting it on the feather.
Then use the videos that are available. One of the best, Czech sculler Vaclav Chalupa, winner of the 2012 Thomas Keller Medal, implements this full palm grip, with the hands almost overdoing it at the catch. (Watch this 4:00 video about Chalupa, which includes some shots close enough to inspect his hands and wrists).
I must credit coach John Riley of Penn AC for opening the door to this subject. John used the image of water always running down toward the knuckles - it was an image that sticks.
Good luck with this and remember: it takes 1,000 strokes to make a change - but if you don't make the change, nothing is going to improve in those 1,000 strokes.
Columnist Duncan Spencer is a former newspaper reporter with The Hill; he has rowed at Yale University, Oxford University, and Capital Rowing Club. He is a former US Team member, a Henley gold medalist, multiple Head of the Charles and USRowing Masters National Championship medalist, and an incurable rowing addict.
*Before implementing changes to your stroke, ask your coach how the ideas Duncan has presented would affect the preferred technique of your club.*