*For rowers/people who are on a Crew team!

Question

I am a girl on a high school rowing team, now that its nearing the end of summer i need to bump up my gym workout to better my erging for fall. right now i am just biking hard for 35-45 minutes every day, just to keep my cardio up. should i add in some other things, preferably NOT erging

Answer 1

Hi, I'm also a high school rower in a similar situation (training for the British Indoor Rowing Championships in November).

Unfortunately, the best way to improve your erg times is to erg. So if you find the idea of training this way even remotely bearable you should incorporate UT2 - UT1 workouts into your routine. A Concept 2 exercises 86% of your muscles and offers a much more effective cardiovascular workout than biking.

I would recommend 30 minutes or 2x 6k with 4 minutes rest if you choose this option.

An alternative is to vary your training, making it fun. I assume that for the rest of the season you will be working to a coach's plan so you may want to use this opportunity to try other sports - swimming, running, tennis, e.t.c.

What you should definitely do is to add core stability exercises to your training. This will reduce the likelihood of back injury, and having a stronger trunk will improve your rowing technique and erg scores.

A good website for core stability exercises is:

http://www.brianmac.co.uk/corestabex.htm

Also, to further guard against back injury, practise the exercise described in the "Ideas.What if . . ." section of the biomechanics newsletter linked to below. The author recommends 1 or 2 sets of 10-15 reps after each session.

http://biorow.com/RBN_en/2001RowBiomNews...

Whatever you choose, Good Luck!