ROWING PADDLING TECHNIQUE.
Paddling should be to rowing what an easy trot is to racing speed on the cinder-path. A crew when paddling is not intended to exert itself unduly, but to move at a comfortable pace which excludes any sense of fatigue, and enables the men to give their best attention to perfecting themselves in style, and to harmonizing their individual movements with those of the rest.
In paddling men do not slash at the beginning so hard, nor do they grind the rest of the stroke through with the same power as when rowing. Less violent energy is put into the work, and the stroke consequently does not come through so fast. The rate of paddling must therefore be slower than that of rowing, since each stroke takes a longer time for its completion. As a rule, too, the blade is in paddling not quite so deeply covered, and cannot make the same rushing swirl under water. During the earlier stages of practice paddling is merely easier rowing ; it is not so sharply distinguished from hard rowing as it becomes later on. At the outset it is necessary to make your crew both paddle and row with a full swing, in order to get length ineradicably fixed in their style. But later on a coach may tell his men, when he asks them to paddle, not only to use the easier movements prescribed above, but also to rest themselves additionally by using a somewhat shortened swing. Then, when they are to row,
he must call on them to swing forward and reach out longer ; to swing back harder and longer, with a more vigorous beginning ; and to put more force into their leg-drive. A very useful plan, especially for the purpose of getting a crew finally together, is to make them do long stretches of paddling varied here and there by about a dozen or twenty strokes of rowing, care being taken, however, not to allow the paddling to get dead and dull, and a special point being made of getting the rowing not only hard, but very long.
Paddling is a difficult art to learn, and only the very best crews paddle really well with balance, rhythm, and ease. Many a time I have seen a good crew and an inferior one paddling along the course together, and almost invariably the good crew, which had mastered the trick of paddling at a slow stroke and with perfect ease, was distanced. Yet a moment afterwards, when they ranged up alongside, and started together for a two minutes' burst of rowing, the good crew would leave its opponents as though they were standing still.
How TO WORK THE STROKE UP TO RACING