THE SPORT OF ROWING and attempt to copy them. One can never be absolutely sure of the purpose of a particular drill or a particular aspect of style, and it is very easy to jump to the wrong conclusions.”860 Andrew Carter: “I believe very firmly that there are myths in rowing that may originally have been grounded in fact, but mimicking over years or the misin- terpretation of information has significantly distorted the truth. “With my area being biomechanics, I really am sensitive to these myths, mantras, and misinterpretations, and I am continuously amazed at how ‘high up’ in the coaching community they not only exist but are perpetuated.”861 The result is mutation, the unintended and accidental transformation of an idea as it passes from one individual to another. As in biology, mutation may occasionally work out for the better. Indeed, mutation in nature is the engine of change for advancement. But most of the time . . . it is not for the better. It is for the worse . . . More is Better! . . . or Is It? It seems to be part of human nature for a rower or a coach to conclude that if a particular aspect of technique or training is good, then more of it must be better. So a technique tends to become more extreme, more exaggerated over time. It seems to be part of the natural maturation process. If a little discipline is good, then more discipline must be better. If erect posture is good, military posture must be better. If mileage is good, then more mileage must be better. 860 Gladstone, personal conversation, 2005 861 Carter, personal correspondence, 2005 We will discover frequently during rowing history that the “more is better” philosophy will play itself out in the area of force application. A technique originally based on Schubschlag tends to gradually evolve over time into Kernschlag. Apparently, if pulling hard is good, then pulling harder or more affirmatively or more assertively or more aggressively must be better. Ignoring the fact that both Schubschlag and Kernschlag already are a product of maximum effort, making the entry the primary focus of the pullthrough seems to appeal to our primitive human sensibilities. It seems to be human nature to want to “use a bigger hammer” to get a job done. Having evolved to make quick movements, leg muscles are well suited for generating explosive effort. If you start pushing them down faster and faster and faster, if you focus on punching more and more, it can happen to a technique so gradually over time, over months or years or even decades, that I don’t know if you’d notice it even from within the boat. At some point, a smooth force application with emphasis on applying maximal force as quickly as possible, theoretically and experientially a laudable goal, tends to mutate into an explosive force singularity upon entry, a punch followed by the rest of the stroke. This two-part pullthrough has been universally understood on both the cerebral and practical levels to be dysfunctional when it comes to moving boats. We will soon find that this very mutation path was certainly a major factor in the decline of English Orthodoxy. History’s Greatest Lesson Over and over, the second- or third- generation mutated and dysfunctional Kernschlag version of a successful original smooth Kernschlag or Schubschlag technique will turn out to be an evolutionary 226
