THE SPORT OF ROWING “When the people of Henley decided to stage their own regatta in 1839, the club was asked to provide an umpire. The following year, it won the Grand Challenge Cup, the first of many successes. Finally in 1897, Leander moved to a permanent home in Henley, where it has remained.”6893 In 1990, the coxless-pair of Redgrave and Pinsent had come only third in the World Championships behind the defending champion GDR crew and the Pimenov brothers.6894 “It was the first time in twenty races with Steve that the Pimenovs had beaten him,”6895 and that was the situation when Jürgen Grobler arrived at Leander. Pinsent: “He was smaller than one might imagine, but stocky. He had never been a great rower, but his magic was in his eyes. You were first attracted by his smile, quick and dynamic, augmented by a gold- capped tooth, but his eyes were the real ice- breaker. His English was stilted but passable; most important of all, he spoke rowing.”6896 Training “At first, the two Brits were very skeptical of Grobler’s methods. He had them rowing huge, low-rate mileage to build an aerobic base.”6897 Redgrave: “In previous years, we used to practice at normal race pace for most of the time. He had us doing this long distance, slow, plodding training. “The main difference was that Jürgen introduced weight training, which I hadn’t done for a number of years. There was also less water work than I had done under Mike 6893 Redgrave, op. cit., p. 136 6894 See Chapter 79. 6895 Pinsent, p. 50 6896 Ibid, pp. 47-8 6897 Macia, op. cit., p. 53 [Spracklen], with whom I used to do a lot of mileage but nothing else.”6898 Pinsent: “Steve grumbled, not just about the training but about being moved to bow. He had stroked in 1990, and then by early ‘91 I was moved, and he never got the seat back off me.”6899 6898 Redgrave, op. cit., p. 152 6899 Pinsent, personal correspondence, 2007 Author and friend 1918
