THE SPORT OF ROWING The Enduring Courtney Stroke When asked what technique he taught at Cornell, Charles Courtney replied, “There is no such thing as a Courtney Stroke; the only stroke that wins is the ‘hard pull’ stroke, where every man pulls each stroke steady and hard throughout, and continues to do so from the time the word ‘Go!’ is given until the course is covered.”1463 This was Courtney the curmudgeon speaking. The real Courtney was a remarkably kind, thoughtful and innovative coach. A decade before they became standard equipment on Pocock shells, he experimented with rolling axles on his sliding seats1464 and with sliding riggers, designed to keep the mass of his oarsmen’s bodies from having to move up and down the keel of the shell. And like Bob Cook, he used photography to analyze and teach technique.1465 Slide length ended up moderate by modern standards, and erect posture was emphasized with +30° body angle forward at the entry. “The back should be straight, as the lungs are then enabled to do their work more easily and satisfactorily, and there is no unnecessary strain on the abdominal muscles. The bend should be at the hips, and with no kink in the back.”1466 Correct posture can be seen in the posed photos of the 1888 and 1892 crews which accompany earlier chapters of this book, but the limited body angle shown would have been the position taken prior to a racing start. Recovery Crowther: “They could row at a pace that often went under 30, but whatever the 1463 Courtney, qtd. by Young, p. 53 1464 Look, pp. 110-1 1465 Mendenhall, Coaches, Ch. III, p. 8 1466 Courtney, qtd. By Look, p. 144 stroke, all the crews nursed their recovery, and the slide was slow. “There were no pronounced features. The catch was hard but not evident – merely a steady application of power from the moment that the oar touched the water [Schubschlag] - and if any one thing was distinctive, it was the recovery, which was very slow.”1467 Courtney described the recovery he coached as follows: “The slide should be started at first rapidly, but gradually slowed up before the finish in order not to have the weight of the oarsmen brought up too suddenly on the stretcher.”1468 This was a holdover from his original sculling technique and from his Pump- Handle and Extended Body Swing Styles. Concurrency The concurrent use of the legs and back would also spread. Cornell rowing historian Charles Van Patten Young: “Combining modified [back] swing with the leg drive and recovery, he developed a stroke which combined to the nicest degree the maximum power and speed with the minimum of effort, and which has gradually been adopted by every successful coach in the country.”1469 Origin of the Conibear Stroke Looking back from the perspective of the 1950s, British rowing appreciated “two race-winning characteristics of the American style – the lightning recovery of the hands leading to extreme steadiness forward, and the use of legs throughout the stroke in the water,”1470 the first innovation having originated at Cornell and the second having 1467 Crowther, p. 136 1468 Qtd. by Kelley, pp. 217-8 1469 Young, qtd. by Look, pp. 131-2 1470 Haig-Thomas & Nicholson, p. 26 388
