SPRING NEWSLETTER 2015

Spring 2015

Looking back at the fastest YARRA crew….Phew look at that time they did.. The Barambah and five other Mighty Commercial EIGHTS will be competing again this year. Drop the hammer and go for the doctor...

Through The Lens

I stumbled into rowing through my child, like many watching your children compete at a school

level sparked an interest in the sport. I love the teamwork, the skill, the technique, and finally the

camaraderie associated with the facets that make up a rowing club. As most of you know anoth-

er passion is taking photographs – I don’t like being in them, so the best way to avoid this is to find

yourself on the other side of the camera. Rowing in general takes place early – which is great for

photographers whom want to steer clear of the harsh midday light of the sun.

My first outing with the club was down at the “Urban Rowing Regatta” at Coomera earlier this

year. The people helping rig and setup boats all working towards a common goal is infectious. A

learning experience for me with more experienced members showing me the facets of preparing

for racing.

Rigging and pre-checking all is right before racing

The balance of the pair – a thing that is great to watch when it’s done well.

Our resident photographer TONY RUSH with a view

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Rowing through the winter brings its challenges but also its benefits. I love the hues and colours during this

time – it’s calming to me and honours those that are dedicated to training.

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Contemplations with Tony Rush

I look forward to taking many more images and documenting mine and others progress and learning this

sport. I’ve been told I’ve just another 40 years of learning to get a handle on it, so I probably won’t get to

learn everything before I have to rack my oars for the last time. But until then, I hope to take every learn-

ing opportunity, and hopefully a few good images of some fellow club members in the meantime.

See you on the water.

Tony Rush

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In the last week of the September school holiday the CRC youth women’s squad headed down to Maclean for our annual rowing camp to start our season. At boat loading we all learnt from Isi why riding skate-boards and rowing doesn’t match. We arrived at Maclean mid morning and after rigging the boats went for a cycle past the cane farms, with a little adventure through some of the fields before lunch. The after-noon saw our first row, a slow easy row to enjoy the calm of rowing in a country town.

The next morning we were out again and we appreciated the calm flat water which was a nice change from the chaotic choppy waters of the Brisbane River. Throughout the camp we all swapped around in sculls, doubles and for some of our first attempts at the pair. We were fortunate to meet some of the Maclean girls that will be joining up with us for the New Zealand tour in December and hear the stories of what it is like to go to a school next to a graveyard. Harold the coach, who is well known amongst many rowers came down and had a look at us on the water and told us about the town and oth-er places to ride.

We didn’t see Maddy’s cow, but enjoyed Zara’s warm up sessions, Emma’s netball stories and Bailee’s drills in a scull. Kate had the chance to start her driving lessons and Zoe and Isi’s flexibility has to be seen to be believed. Over all the camp was a great success and I along with the whole squad would like to thank Peter and Noel for their time and expertise, as well as, Sharon and Simone for bringing us the comforts of home. Finally, Jenny (Emma’s mum) who taught us about core stability which got Peter even more excited about “Ab work”. Not many squads can boast they have their own physio. Returning from Maclean we have settled into our training program on the water and land training with Jenny coming down on Wednesdays to help us with our ab work and stretching. Noel is at us about doing ergs but so far have dodged them.

Our squad entered the Sunshine Coast Regatta and picked up 3 firsts and a second for the 4 Group3 events entered. Maddy and Zoe had big wins in their sculls and the quad had a good row for an easy first place. Kate and Bailee entered their first race in a pair and picked up a second place. Whilst all the races were 1500m Kate and Bailee probably did an extra 100m or so with their steering. We were able to get everyone down to training last Wednesday and for the first time and put a VIII on the water.

CRC Junior Womens Squad News from our chicks with sticks

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Peter and Noel were really surprised by the standard of the row and now believe that we do listen to what they have to say (well some of the time)

First time out - Bailee, Sasha, Isi, Zara, Zoe, Maddy, Emma, Kate and Claire On Saturday we headed down to Murwillumbah to compete in the Tweed Regatta. Crystal and Clara from Lower Clarence Rowing Club who will be part of our squad in New Zealand drove up from Maclean to compete with us in composite crews. Our Group 5 Quad of Sasha, Isi, Bailee and Clara were caught in the worst of the conditions but had a good row for clear win.

Crystal, Maddy, Emma and Zoe competed in the Group 3 Quad and also had a convincing win. Through-out the day we rowed in various combinations of doubles and sculls and all had good rows. We had the chance to compete against school mates and others we had met who are at different clubs which makes the day great fun. It was a great experience to row with the LCRC girls and we look forward to meeting up with them in Brisbane before heading to New Zealand. Special thanks to Harold for com-ing up and supporting us and as always to all the parents that are there to help with the day and back at boat unloading. It was a long day and we were all glad to get home at the end of the day.

If anyone is interested in joining our squad have a chat to one of us or Peter and Noel for all the information.

CRC Junior Womens Squad continued.

Sprung in Grafton by the Daily Examiner

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TASMAN TOURERS: The four girls from the Lower Clarence set to take on the international stage in New

Zealand - Crystal Piper, Gemma Dane, Clare Samms and Teagan McFarlane.

FOUR girls from the Lower Clarence Rowing and Sculling Club have been selected to participate in a seven-day

tour of New Zealand to compete in Waikato Christmas Regatta on Lake Karapiro.

Departing from Brisbane on December 9, Crystal Piper, Gemma Dane, Clare Samms and Teagan McFarlane are

part of a team of 10 girls competing for the Commercial Rowing Club in combined crews.

They will compete in three events of 2000 metres.

The Maclean girls have been competing in crews with the Commercial Rowing Club in the recent Tweed Heads

Regatta at Murwillumbah, with CRC member Peter Toon confident the tour will result in many top three positions.

“The Maclean girls will give our girls the incentive and confidence to win a few events,” he said.

Their coach on the Lower Clarence, Harold Kratz, said that it was an exciting opportunity for them to row against

world class competition. “It‟s a big standard, they‟re going up against some top New Zealand rowers of their age,”

he said. “I‟m very proud of them, they‟ve got the opportunity and they‟ve taken it which means a lot. “It‟s an op-

portunity a lot of people never get, to go over there and row on the Olympic course. “It‟ll be tough, but we will see

how they handle it.” Kratz is confident that after a successful afternoon rowing with the CRC that the Maclean girls

will come home with some podium finishes.

While on their tour, the girls will visit the New Zealand High Performance Rowing Centre as special guests of the

head coach of New Zealand rowing, Noel Donaldson, to experience first hand the facilities used by professionals.

Kratz said that the girls oweD it to their parents to make the most of their time in New Zealand.“They‟ve got full

facilities and everything they need,” he said. The final words from the coach if they want to be victorious?

“They‟ll do their club proud, provided they go to bed early of a night.”

Commercial girls to race in Karapiro

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On the 9th of December a squad of girls will depart for a seven day tour of New Zealand to compete

in the Waikato Christmas Regatta on Lake Karapiro.

This will be the third time the club has taken a tour to this regatta. Located on the course of the 2011

World Rowing Championships the regatta runs for three days with over 3,500 entries. The regatta

includes entries from the New Zealand elite athletes. In past years, Mahe Drysdale, Haimish Bond,

Eric Murray and Emma Twigg all shared the course with our modest squad at the regatta. Lake Kara-

piro is outside the village of Cambridge where the New Zealand elite rowers live while training full

time at their High Performance Training Centre.

Finish tower and spectator tents at Lake Karapiro.

There are ten girls touring with the club, six are CRC members with another 4 girls from the Lower

Clarence Rowing and Sculling Club recruited to join us, competing as Commercial Rowing Club in

combined crews. All girls will compete in three events over 2,000 metres. There are no race distanc-

es under 2,000 metres in New Zealand. The girls from Maclean have been competing in crews with

our girls in the recent Tweed Heads Regatta at Murwillumbah. To those who saw the regatta, the

Maclean girls will give our girls the incentive and confidence to win a few events.

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Looking down the course at Lake Karapiro from the boating pontoons.

St Peter’s School in Cambridge will be our host during the tour, with the parents of the school’s

rowers providing meals and boats for the week. We are grateful to have the support of their Row-

ing Coordinator, Janey Wackrow, who has been most helpful on all our tours.

Our girls will visit the New Zealand High Performance Rowing Centre as the guests of Noel Don-

aldson, the Head Coach of New Zealand Rowing. Noel was formally the head of Rowing Austral-

ia. He now leads the very successful New Zealand Rowing Programme. Noel will introduce our

girls to any of the New Zealand World Champions who will be around. The girls are particularly

keen to meet Zoe McBride, the World Lightweight Single Champion, who some follow on social

media.

Following the regatta on Sunday, the squad will tour the Waitomo Glow Worm underground cave

system, travelling down underground river rapids for two hours. On Tuesday we travel for a day

in Auckland for shopping and sightseeing around the city before heading home for Christmas.

The six Commercial girls undertaking the tour are Bailee Cowie, Zoe Alcorn, Maddy Wightman,

Zara Hepple, Isi Johnson and Clare Bacon. The Maclean girls include Crystal Piper, Gemma

Dane, Clare Samms and Teagan McFarlane. The Maclean girls travelled to the Tweed Regatta to

compete with the CRC girls in the crews selected for the Waikato Regatta. The results at Murwil-

lumbah give us great confidence that this tour will result in many finals entries and podium per-

formances.

Graeme has been to Venice and now he has a wet patch..

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Graeme Cannell

In May 2012 there was a photo taken of a mystery sighting of a cox in the middle of Rome on

the Tiber River in a slinky black cocktail dress. This was obviously a highly talented person

perfecting advanced rowing techniques for competition outside Italy and possibly Europe. In-

terpol has finally positively identified the cox as Penny Dixon moonlighting from Commercial

Rowing Club in Brisbane. The all male crew look a little un-coordinated as they operate under

considerable pressure.

For anyone interested in a different rowing experience while visiting Venice then check out:

http://rowvenice.org/prova-voga-venetian-rowing-lessons/

One can take a gondola on The Grand Canal for usually 30 minutes or have a lesson on how to

row a gondola for about the same price for 90 minutes for a memorable experience. The busi-

ness was started by an Australian, Jane Caporal, who went to Venice in her early years, met a

young Italian guy and made Venice her home. She became interested in gondolas and regularly

races in regattas and uses a more stable old version of gondola called a batellina coda di gam-

bero for lessons. The route includes the lagoon (a crescent-shaped body of water between the

Italian mainland and the Adriatic sea) however the weather was somewhat rough for our lesson

so we had a longer than usual trip that included many canals and The Grand Canal. Rowing in

narrow canals requires more finesse however one can see more of the signature Venetian archi-

tecture. If you book in allow considerable time to find the meeting spot as Venice is worse than

searching for a camel in a Turkish souk.

Venice has four bridges to walk across the Grand Canal however there are seven Traghetto

(ferry) piers where one can catch a gondola back/forward for currently about 2 euros (or walk

to a bridge). It is traditional to stand up however one can sit on the side or fall in if you so de-

sire. (see: http://europeforvisitors.com/venice/articles/traghetto.htm).

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Notes by you to help improve this Newsletter

Meet a Member

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Ladies and Gents please meet our mystery rower

See if you can guess who this is,,,

A vivid childhood memory is …Getting hit with a wooden spoon.

The thing I fear most is …..wooden spoons

My guiltiest pleasure is …licking melted cooking chocolate from the wooden spoon...

My first job was as a fat puller from inside of each chicken carcass prior to roasting.

My first rowing memory is …pain, the pain, the overwhelming and shocking pain.

The best thing I‟ve ever done was …feed the family.

A song that gives me goosebumps is …any Christmas song...oh sorry was that goose-bumps or a cold shivers?

The question I‟m most often asked is …what the fuck are you doing?

My best holiday was … at home.

I‟m most contented when …my head is nearing the pillow.

My secret skill is... Pretending to be skillful

My association with CRC began ….decades ago. I was rejected many times but then the club became desperate...

My proudest moment was….becoming a granny.

Proudest rowing achievement as a CRC member …….Tearing my zooty while bending down to sit in the boat.

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Aries Be comfortable when you are on a learning curve as this point is the core of making transi-tions. Find the child inside you – experience life hands on, live in the moment and have FUN!

Taurus Most people who are driven, search out stimulating ways to live life. You’re a rower and everday is a new adventure on the water.

Gemini There will be a big celebration in the next couple of months and it is your time to shine! Be calm, confident and enjoy your success.

Cancer Just as the tide changes, another rowing season passes. Although you may feel like you are not making progress, celebrate your achievements. A new moon is coming and new opportunities await.

Leo There is a satisfaction interacting with people who are doing challenging work or winning in competition and those around you derive indirect pleasure from your success. Don’t underesti-mate the impact you have on people around you.

Virgo Did you know there are several people inside you? One person when you are at home, an-other when you are with your friends. Another when you are at work and before a competi-tion...look out ... as you unleash the warrior self.

Libra We all want to row the perfect stroke and we practice and practice. If we are doing what’s right and we keep doing it, how can it ever be wrong? Unless, that is, we think we are doing what’s right but we are actually doing what’s wrong. Celebrate our coaches and thank them for their humour and patience.

Scorpio Little things can make a big difference. The greatest journeys on the river can only happen by taking one stroke at a time. Be patient and enjoy the journey!

Sagittarius Don’t like rowing in the dark? Don’t worry, the shortest day of the year has passed and your wish for more sunshine will be upon you soon!

Capricorn One stroke at a time you paddle along focused and making great progress...and then sud-denly you feel something creeping over your shoulder. Remain on full alert and ready for the un-expected!

Aquarius The winter months bring on the sniffles and some days you just feel like you’re in the fog. Just push on and the fog will lift!

Pisces Do your planning in advance so you don’t get blocked on what you want to achieve. If you had an infinite time and money, what boat would you like to row, what regattas would? Write these things down - what does it look like and what will it take to get you there. You are now on your way!

Rowerscopes— Spring 2015

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Bill, what the hell is the Lady Margaret?

Coaches Answer

“Lady Margaret” style is a style of rowing named after the Lady Margaret Boat Club at Cambridge, which is in fact the rowing club of St John‟s College, Cambridge. The name derives from lady Margaret Beaufort, the col-lege‟s foundress. In spite of being the oldest Cambridge college boat club, founded in 1825, it was remarkably unsuccessful, and garnered only to Head of the River titles in the summer regatta, May Bumps, between 1825 and 1945. The fortunes of the college underwent an abrupt turnaround after the war under the coaching of Roy Meldrum, who developed a unique style which came to be known as the Lady Margaret style. Before understanding the significance of this style, it is important to understand that English rowing in the peri-od from the 1920s to the early 1960s was dominated by a debate between the adherents of “Orthodoxy” and “Fairbairnism”. Orthodoxy placed an emphasis on style, particularly the rock over, and body posi-tion. Fairbairnism, named after Steve Fairbairn the coach of Jesus College, Cambridge, emphasised that oars-men should “drive at your blade and let the body and slide take care of themselves.” Meldrum‟s Lady Margaret style was an extreme variant of Orthodoxy, which utilised such a long finish position that the oarsmen where almost horizontal at the finish, with the blade drawn well into the ribs. This was associ-ated with a slow movement of the hands a way, and a long and deliberate swing over before coming up the slide. The picture below shows the 1950 British rowing crew rowing in something approaching the Lady Mar-garet style. Meldrum‟s introduction of this style of rowing coincided with a period of incredible success for Lady Margaret Boat Club, and the won the Head of the River in May Bumps continuously from 1950 to 1954. Crews rushed to emulate their style, although after the death of Meldrum in 1955 they ceded the Head of the River to Jesus Col-lege until 1959. The Lady Margaret style had a number of advantages, in that it emphasised a long stroke, and rotation of the outside shoulder at the finish. Another benefit was that it tended to restrain rush up the slide by keeping the rate lower. On the negative side, the lady Margaret style put a great deal of focus on the arms in the latter part of the stroke, to the exclusion of the legs, and even the effective use of the muscles of the lower back. The decline of the Lady Margaret style is attributable not only to the death of Meldrum, and the consequent diminution of his influence, but also the work of Hugh “Jumbo” Edwards in unifying Orthodoxy and Fairbairnism. Lady Margaret rowing is no longer a competitive rowing style, but it is a useful exercise in training. It can be used to teach the proper rotation of the outside shoulder, and also to introduce stability into the back turn in crews that tend to have inconsistent finish length. A final note is worth making. Lady Margaret rowing was a product of its time, and the equipment used. Up until the late 1960s at least, most crews rowed with pencil blades, shown below.

Not only were these symmetrical - as opposed to the asymmetric cleaver blades used today - they were much narrower, which made it easier to get a clean extraction when sitting so far back on the finish. Because the blade was narrower, the crew did not h=need to tap down so much at the finish, a good thing is you are almost recum-bent! Bill O'Chee

Improving your FINISH by Bill O’Chee

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You will be pleased to note that there is a strong Commercial connection in all of this. One man who had a profound effect on Edwards, and who coached him to multiple wins at Henley, was Steve Fairbairn, a sometime member of Commercial Rowing Club. Sherlock Holmes and the Perfect Finish Irrespective of the class of boat one rows, a powerful and effective finish is the key to achieving maximum boat speed. Whilst the dynamics of a good finish are easily achieved in a sculling boat, many rowers find getting a good finish more difficult when rowing sweep oar. A clue to how to develop the desired power and efficiency may come from a surprising source: the adventures of Sherlock Holmes. In “The Final Problem” Holmes is left at the top of the Reichenbach Falls with his arch enemy, Professor Moriarty. Neither man returns from the falls, and Holmes is presumed dead. Only much later in “The Adventure of the Empty House” does he reappear, explaining to Watson the means by which he escaped plunging over the cliff with Moriarty. Many years later, the great English coach, Hugh „Jumbo” Edwards would draw inspiration from this life and death struggle, and use it to describe the ultimate rowing action at the finish as the „Moriarty‟ since “it was undoubtedly the action that Sherlock Holmes used to pitch Prof. Moriarty off the ledge above the Reichenbach Falls, while just recovering his own balance.” Before getting into this interesting rowing description, a brief biographical note on „Jumbo‟ Edwards is in order. He learned to row at Westminster School before going up to Oxford in 1925. He was the only freshman to row in the 1926 Oxford Blue Boat, which lost to Cambridge in extraordinary circumstances. The crews were level just after the beginning of the Hammersmith Bend, when Edwards, at five, collapsed half way down Chis-wick Eyot. A few strokes later, the four man struck him in the back and forced him up, and Edwards struggled to the finish. After the race, Edwards was told he “was no longer needed to row for the university” and effectively run out of Oxford. Edwards left to become a school teacher the next year, and began rowing with London Rowing Club, where he was coached by sometime Commercial Rowing Club member, Steve Fairbairn. Under his tutelage, Edwards would go on to win the Grand at Hen-ley twice, the Stewards‟ twice and the Goblets twice. He was the last man to win three finals at Henley in one day. At the 1932 Olympics he won two gold medals. He later returned to Oxford where he became a coaching legend. Edwards is significant in that he had been coached by both Steve Fairbairn, and Guy Nickalls, who represented different schools of technique - Fairbairnism and Orthodoxy respectively. It was Edwards who was to unify these schools, and also to introduce stress gauges and biometrics to rowing analysis. In “The Way of a Man with a Blade” Edwards described the perfect finish in the following terms: “Now, to keep up the power and speed of the pull on the handle we have got to bring other muscles into play. As the quadriceps are finishing their stint in flattening down the knees, and the body swing is about to slow down, the shoulders and arms take up the load, being drawn back by the powerful action of the latissimus dorsi, assisted at the same time by the continued use of the erector spinae to arch the back…. Care must be taken, not only that the body does not swing too far back, but that all its momen-tum is transferred to the oar handle by drawing it to a standstill, and just as the hands are coming home, relaxing the erector spi-nae to recover the balance of the head and body by a powerful sweep back of the outside shoulder, while the back is straighten-ing. “As the hands are coming home, the inside elbow drops to the side, the upper arm being vertical, and the wrist will arch naturally, providing the greater share of the pull is done with the outside wrist. The inside shoulder has been drawn back only to its normal position on the body. The outside shoulder is swung back well beyond the perpendicular, so that the elbow is on a level with the oar handle. The body is leaning in towards the rigger and this tilting of the body raises the outside shoulder slightly higher than the inside.” Edwards identifies some common errors often seen on the Brisbane River. The most common of these is finishing the stroke with the shoulders square to the sides of the boat, so that the outside should does not rotate at the finish. Failing to draw the outside should past the inside shoulder takes the latissimus dorsi out of the action and leaves the rower relying principally on the deltoid - a much smaller muscle - to draw the finish. Additionally, a square on finish means that the forearm deviates too far from being perpendicular to the handle, which reduces maximum forward drive on the boat. The other common error is falling away from the rigger. Edwards emphasises the need for the outside shoulder to be slightly higher than the inside shoulder in the draw. This is common sense, as it means the shoulder is aligned in the same plane as the shaft of the oar. When the outside shoulder is level with the inside, the efficient alignment of shoulders and shaft are compro-mised with the draw being undertaken by the inside arm and not the outside. Because the inside arm has less leverage and less travel, this again reduces boat speed at the finish. A powerful finish is the sine qua non of good sweep oar rowing. And with proper understanding it is simply “elementary, my dear Watson.” Bill O‟Chee

Next Edition

Contributions for the next edition of

the CRC Newsletter would be most

welcome. Please email news items,

photographs or ideas you may have

for the Club Newsletter to:

jbandcoptyltd@gmail.com

Club Improvements

Do you have some good ideas for

improvements around the club?

Contact Steve

secretary@commercial.com

CRC Committee & Contacts

Club President - Penny Dixon president@commercialrowing.com

Vice President Chairman-Fleur Spriggs

Club Captain - Jo Cook captain@commercialrowing.com

Treasurer - Steve Monkman treasurer@commercialrowing.com

Secretary - Michelle Holland secre-tary@commercialrowing.com

Boat Captain - John McGuiness boatcaptain@commercialrowing.com

Rowing Captain - Ross Kynaston rowingcaptain@commercialrowing.com

Membership Secretary Assistant Treas-urer- Mary Fenn membersecretary@commercialrowing.com

Regatta Secretary - Kate Beddoes rowingsecretary@commercialrowing.com

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SPRING NEWSLETTER 2015

Commercial Rowing Club sculling camp on Lake Kurwongbah

Any errors in this punlication are proudly committed by JB