My Favorite Rowing Drill: Rowing-in-Place (Video and More)

I post this with some trepidation that people will think that making a video means I’m claiming this drill as my own. Rowing-in-place, or the “push-pull drill” as I’ve also heard it called, is one of the first drills that I learned when I started coaching at Craftsbury in 2019, and it quickly became one of my favorites for my own sculling and coaching. I’ve been unable to find a good, publicly available demo video to share this with people more broadly, so I did one. Video and notes below on how I use it in coaching.

I don’t claim to have invented anything, this drill or otherwise. I’m just trying to record in writing/video good things I’ve learned so that other rowers and coaches can use it too. In this case, I learned rowing-in-place first from Craftsbury coach and then-director Troy Howell, who learned it from Ellen Braithwaite, who learned to scull at Craftsbury and is an awesome open water rower and one of my favorite people to coach with. If she didn’t invent it herself, Ellen and Troy together are at least responsible for propagating it at Craftsbury. You may well know it already by another name or from someone else. Please comment or send in any credit, stories, or video submissions from others, and let’s all get better together.

I highly recommend watching Troy’s 2020 Craftsbury webinar, “Gaining Comfort and Confidence in the 1x,” to learn his framework for training single sculling as a nervous system experience, more about the rowing-in-place drill specifically at 32:40, and a whole lot more that any sculler can do to expand understanding, improve technique, and have fun in the single. Also watch Ellen’s contributions to the panel webinar, “But What Is That Drill For?” in which she talks about rowing-in-place and how she uses it.

Here are the key points of rowing-in-place and one way to use the drill in a technique-focused progression.

Key Technique Points

• The drill at first is just moving slowly, going nowhere, hence the name “IN-PLACE.” Begin slowly, mindfully, and with far less effort in both directions than you think necessary. Those new to rowing-in-place usually fly up the slide to the stern, jam their feet down at the catch, flip or have a near-flip moment, and don’t learn much. Slow down and try to pay attention to the sensations at each point of the stroke: See how slowly you CAN go and how little you CAN move the boat.
• I have seen a variation of rowing-in-place done as a single backing stroke straight into one or more full strokes from the catch. That’s one way to do it, but not the only way, and it’s not what we’re doing at first.
• Keep blades squared and in the water the entire time (“drive” and “recovery”). Do not feather or let the blades lift out of the water at any point during the initial stage of rowing-in-place. Pay close attention to keeping the blades buried and handles flat and how horizontal the movement can be.

Rowing-in-Place Drill Progression

Here’s one way to use rowing-in-place build-ups to focus on one specific technical element of the stroke. Start at the start of the progression, not the end, and don’t be in a rush to get through it. The value is in going through the progression, not getting to the end of it. The goal is to build awareness and skill through each stage, not to get to the end just to check a box and move on.

• Begin in-place: Do one set of 5-10 in-place strokes with no “release,” keeping the blades squared and buried going from the back-end (what would be the release) to the front-end (what would be the entry) and back again. Try to focus on one specific technical element. Stop for 30 seconds or so after each set and reset. You can do several sets this way to maintain focus on the goal technique. Repeat a few or several times, and then move to the next stage when ready.
• Build-up 1: Reset and then take 1-3 in-place strokes followed by an actual release on the very last stroke to let the boat run. Repeat a few or several times, and then move to the next stage when ready.
• Build-up 2: Reset and then take just one in-place stroke followed by three full normal strokes, building pressure on each stroke while continuing to focus on your goal technique. Repeat a few or several times, and then move to the next stage when ready.
• Build-up 3: Reset and then take just one in-place stroke followed by 5-10 full normal strokes building up pressure and speed while continuing to focus on your goal technique. If you notice technique slipping after stroke #5, stop and reset rather than rowing sloppily through all 10.

I’ve gotten to watch Craftsbury coaches use rowing-in-place in all sorts of creative and insightful ways to focus on any element of stroke technique. It’s not just a drill for catch timing, or suspension, or sequencing, or body prep. It can be all of these things and also much more, taking Troy’s concept of nervous system training from his webinar (see last week’s post).

Just rowing-in-place slowly and mindfully for several sets of 5-10 strokes is how I’ve begun each new season of rowing since learning it at Craftsbury. I don’t row when I’m not coaching a camp, so when I get in a boat in May it’s been at least seven months since my last time rowing. Rowing-in-place reintroduces my nervous system to the unique sensations of single sculling and reminds me what I’m trying to do in the session. Troy takes a phrase from the Feldenkrais method: “the absence of relaxation is fatiguing.” I try to identify areas of unnecessary fatigue while rowing-in-place and then eliminate them when rowing.

I’ve yet to find a better drill to bridge the gap in “mind-muscle connection” between land training and the sport task. Remember from my prior “study spotlight” post about external cues on outcomes or targets of an action being generally better for sport performance than internal cues on inputs or specific muscle actions. We don’t want to be thinking about muscle activation details (internal cues) when rowing normally or focusing on power and performance, but some consideration in the augmented drill environment can be helpful to change technique.

Here’s how I think we can get the best of both worlds from our instructional and cueing strategy, referring to last week’s post with the build-up progression.

Stage 1: On-Land

Introduce a muscular stimulus on land immediately before launching to prime the goal technique for the technical focus of the session. Use a simple bodyweight-only exercise for lower intensity and higher volume for activation. The goal is to develop a high amount of muscular awareness with just a small amount of fatigue, not doing so much so that the fatigued muscles can’t perform.

Pick just one goal! This is big for session clarity, as well as for attentional and physical fatigue.

• If your goal is body prep and achieving length and power through the hips: do 30-50 bodyweight standing hip hinges to ingrain the hip-pivot motion.
• If your goal is keeping shoulders down and getting hands outside the gunnels at the catch: do 30-50 bodyweight Y-W-T raises or light band pullaparts to prime the mid-back and rear shoulder muscles.
• If your goal is drive-phase suspension and connection through the torso: do 30-50 high-handle bodyweight rows (towel handle on a sturdy boat rack!) to get the shoulders down with active lats.
• If your goal is sitting up at the release and connection of hips and torso: do 30-50 seated rockbacks for back-end pivot and abdominal tension.

That’s four “lesson plans” for one drill. You could do a whole week of this with one session framed around each element, then put it all together on the fifth day with some race-pace piece work. I’d love to hear from anyone who actually does this.

Stage 2: Paddle Warm-Up

Tune-in to the sensation of rowing after this activation while paddling for 5-10 minutes. This is part 1 of the cognitive training – can we improve technique at slow speeds through increased focus? We’re also priming the athlete to focus on just one thing in this session, not all the things.

Stage 3: Rowing-in-Place

Continue to think about the activated area while doing the initial rowing-in-place stage of just going back and forth slowly without actually going anywhere. This is part 2 of the cognitive training, focusing on the goal technique through a simplified drill environment. From Coach Dan John: “The main thing is to keep the main thing the main thing.”

After a few or several sets of just rowing-in-place, begin the build-up stages. This is the transition from cognitive training to physical training. During the final stages of build-ups and going into continuous rowing, either trade the internal focus for an external focus that supports the goal technique, or try to just clear the mind and hold onto the sensations from rowing-in-place.

Stage 4: Continuous Rowing

Remember from my recent attentional focus study spotlight post that the control “no cue” condition of undirected attention was as effective as the (admittedly weak) external cue condition of verbally directing attention to the video/environment. “Don’t think, just feel,” is fine, and likely even better, once we’ve dedicated 20-30 minutes of focused physical and mental attention through the land activation, paddle, and initial rowing-in-place stage. And remember, less talking when athletes are working! Whenever possible, use debriefing during breaks rather than verbal feedback delivered concurrently while athletes are engaged in the task and processing their own intrinsic feedback. In this phase, we see what sticks. We will likely not achieve total technical transformation in one single training session. Assess where the athlete has made progress, debrief the drill and session, and prepare to build on it for the next session.

This is how we can gradually shift our focus from internal cueing, augmented by a muscular activation exercise, to external cueing or just focusing on intrinsic feedback from the sport task, without making an all-or-nothing attentional trade. I love to use rowing-in-place as the bridge between the land-based movement focus and the full-speed sport skill focus. I hope this has been helpful for you too.