Olympic challenge: Learn how to float your rowing boat

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10 April 2012

The thing about rowing is that anyone can do it. That is, anyone can do it until they have a GB hopeful sitting behind them shouting a torrent of instructions.

The truth is it's not all floating about on a lake like Renée Zellweger and Hugh Grant in Bridget Jones's Diary, nor is it as simple as using the average gym rowing machine. Wading through the filthy water at the Thames Tradesman Rowing Club in Chiswick toward the double scull I'll be learning in, it's grey and miserable. And it's only the start.

"Rowing is a sport that requires huge dedication. You train for 25 hours a week in all seasons, with only one day off, to compete in just four or five major races over the summer," says 23-year-old Ben Duggan, who trains at Henley's Leander Club with some of Great Britain's brightest rowing hopes.

"There are times when you're sprinting towards the end of a 2,000m race and you push your body to such an extent that you're sick or pass out as you cross the finish line. Your body tells you to stop but you have to ignore that and carry on."
Competing in the single, pair and quadruple scull events, Duggan consumes about 5,000 calories a day - double that of the average man - to fuel his intensive training regime.

But then, you'd probably need a breakfast of egg and bacon sandwiches, porridge, fruit salad and four slices of toast if you'd been out on the open water for a couple of hours - and had to do a two-hour strength and conditioning session in the gym followed by technical training back out in the boat before nightfall.

"Rowing is a strength and endurance sport," Duggan explains. 'We'll do long training sessions of around 24 kilometres over a couple of hours to make our cardiovascular systems as efficient as possible. Then we'll complete more intense 2,000m 'pieces' of around five to seven minutes where we're pushing ourselves to the limit."

In the gym, Duggan will rap out squats, dead lifts and 125kg bench presses to strengthen his quads, hamstrings and glutes to generate the power he needs to push back with his legs, then pull on the oars to propel the boat forwards.

"Rowing is a sport that encourages you to be humble. You're constantly aware that it's a long road to success and even if you dedicate your life to it, you could still fall short of the required standard," says Duggan, who started rowing at 12 when a community project visited his school, Toot Hill Comprehensive in Nottingham. A year later he was winning local regattas and at 17 he was racing for the National Junior team before going to America's Brown University on a rowing scholarship.

Sitting in front of Duggan in the scull, the first challenge is keeping control of the two oars (it's easy to forget that gym rowing machines only have one handle to deal with).

Holding them in a loose grip with my knuckles up, I'm supposed to follow the correct sequence: move arms away, rock onto the balls of my feet, bend my knees as I slide forward and my bottom tucks up towards my heels. Then I drive back with my legs, dip the oars in the water so the blade is "squared" (at a 90-degree angle) to the water and pull my arms back towards my chest.

Simple if you know how and can move lightning fast. Instead, I find myself "catching a crab" as the oar smacks into the water face down, creating drag on the boat, and scratching my knuckles as I try and fail to move my arms in sync.

In a competition, I'd be doing all this while also following the "race plan". A team might be swift off the line, averaging 46 strokes per minute, before "striding onto" a pace of 37 strokes, then sprinting the last 300m at 40 strokes per minute. And that's without considering the pressure of having a rival boat looming beside you - or a strong wind blowing you off course.

"A race is the culmination of all your hard work," says Duggan. "My teammates are like my best friends. It's a very primal thing wanting to beat the competition and achieve something with all of them."

As for me, I emerge with raw knuckles and a red face, embarrassed that I seem to have lost the ability to tell left from right - let alone arm from leg. Duggan made it look so graceful - but beware, rowing's a lot harder than it looks.

Ben Duggan

Age: 23
Height: 175cm
Weight: 88 kilos
Relationship status: Single
Training hours: 25 hours a week
Sporting bling: Won the Eight Heads of the River Race, 2011
Starting block: Came 5th in the quadruple scull at the 2005 Junior World Championships in Germany at the age of 17
Olympic dreams: "An Olympic medal is always the ultimate dream but it's such a long path to that point that even just saying it is a daunting prospect."

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