THE SPORT OF ROWING generating efficiency of my body is a lot better, showing a higher energy output per heart beat. “Maybe it is because I’m built like an albatross, my span being fifteen centimeters longer than my height.’”8709 Breaking Down a Force Curve The real world provides us with a myri- ad variety of force curves. The contrast between Göbel’s and Hain- ing’s is especially interesting. Two World Champion Lightweight Men’s Single Scull- ers rowing the same general technique with- in basically the same historical era; two curves diverging in opposite directions. But these differences are not uncom- mon. Every person’s curve is unique. It makes one ask if an ideal force curve exists and what it might look like. Despite Rekers’ skepticism, could there be a univer- sal right answer for all rowers regardless of gender, size or shape? Early in the Pullthrough Coaches have long agreed that the tran- sition from the recovery must be smooth and the entry must be quick. The power must come on without delay. What would that look like? Presumably, the curve must immediately climb steeply. Then what? The Golden Mean According to Biomechanist Andrew Carter, “Force is a push or a pull on an ob- ject.”8710 The amount of force that an athlete can generate depends on a number of varia- bles: size, strength, fitness, motivation, etc., but at any given moment, it is finite. All 8709 Rekers, op. cit. 8710 Carter, RCA Coaches, Conference, 2005 you can hope to do is apply your full poten- tial at that moment. During a given pullthrough, the rower can apply only so much force to the boat. The question is how to distribute the effort from entry to release. When this is graphed, the area under a force/distance curve repre- sents work. Mathematics tells us that the shape which maximizes the area under that curve, in other words the shape that absolutely maximizes the work, is a parabola, the pre- ferred GDR curve. Refer back to the three Körner curves earlier in this chapter or ahead to the four Kleshnev curves, and the curve with the most area underneath it is that of the GDR Style, Schubschlag in its Classi- cal Technique form. Why not a Box? Dan Lyons:8711 “When I’m on an er- gometer I look at force curves a lot, and what I go for is an immediate spike, and then once you get up there, it is absolutely horizontal, and then there’s an immediate fall off. I mean it should be a rectangle. That’s what the Australians teach. They used strain gauges on their oarlocks to try and get that. “I believe in that.”8712 Common sense says that if you really want to maximize the area under the curve, a box would be the best. Instantaneous appli- cation of maximum power, which is main- tained to the instant of release. So why have so many successful athletes rowed parabo- las? And almost nobody has rowed a box? And explain it in layman’s terms so even a rower can understand. Please! Interestingly, if you let a rope hang from its two ends, it will form a parabola, and that 8711 See Chapters 132 and 144. 8712 Lyons, personal conversation, 2009 2452