INTERNATIONAL ROWING TURNS PROFESSIONAL our trunks were strong, we said, ‘Let’s get it on early! It’s free! Easy speed!’ “We rowed 36 to 40 all the time, and nobody could figure out why we did it. Well, it was because we liked being in front,3606 so we stayed there. “That was my mental state . . . It didn’t always work, but ninety percent of races it did. The Pullthrough Nash: “I would have to say that in those days the opening of our legs and back started at the same time. The back opened and continued all the way as far as we could for the rate. Looking back after all these years, I think we opened our backs a bit too early, but we were strong, and it felt like they wanted to do it. “This was the same as at the University of Washington, but they aimed for a tremendous surge. They wanted power through to the finish, and it seemed to me that they were willing to give away a bit at the catch. “We used our leg drive much differently. We exploded the catch. “We said, ‘We want all energy on the catch so we can bend the shaft earlier.’ “The other thing was that with a Class 2 lever, both anatomically and in leverage mechanics, you get the most benefit as the bent shaft passes 90°, but the real ‘power range’ is often 25° before to 25° after perpendicular. Unless the oar bends early, you may not take full advantage of the beginning of the range. “The loom of the oar, that precious area just above the spoon, has to be fully bent for 3606 In 1960 and 1964, however, Nash’s boats tended to row relatively even splits, start behind and row through their opponents, just as Joe Burk had done and just as a number of today’s high-stroking crews tend to do. See Chapter 163. the middle of the shaft to bend, and you can’t do that late in the pullthrough. It’s too late, so where we differed at Lake Washington from the University of Washington Technique was that everything exploded off that end and bent earlier, and we then held it firm at our endings. “If you think surge to the finish, you risk getting to the sweet spot of the pullthrough arc before the blade gets bent. We wanted to be already at full power going through the real rower’s perpendicular, that 25° on each side of the middle of the stroke. “Those 50° were much more important to us than the end, when we knew that the blades were losing their grip, and if we didn’t bend the shaft early enough in the arc, the boat was already up and gone. “Anybody who has already got the shaft fully bent 25° to 30° before perpendicular is going to get more power from the lever thrusting the boat to the bow. “The ‘60 and ‘64 Olympic boats and all the boats in between were getting the lever to bend another foot farther to the bow, and that’s when the power began to come. We began to feel the boat leaping, and that’s true speed, so then we knew, rowing against Washington or rowing against the Canadians, that we could clean them out as long as they continued that slip-catch entry. The Release Nash: “It would look like we were finishing strong, but there wasn’t a lot of extra juice or thumping on those endings. We weren’t giving it away. We were maintaining, just not adding anything. “We weren’t trying for what you hear today called a ‘power finish.’ We were more interested in the beginning and middle. We didn’t bust it to get the handle into the chest, but we didn’t let it go either. We 991
