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rebeccmeisterFor this morning's practice we attempted to keep all 7 boats in proximity to each other, starting by having the slower boats launch first. That gave me a chance to get this photo while we waited to launch:
Good practice for waiting in line at regattas! (and then also hustling once we have our turn to launch; these aspects of rowing really do cater to twitchy people like me)
It was a bit chilly, but the water was pretty calm and the current has settled down.
Getting 7 boats across lined up is a bit of a project, and we definitely aren't used to doing it.
Thankfully we only really had to do that once.
But from this photo, you can probably begin to appreciate why coaches are always trying to get their crews to bunch up together.
It's really hard to communicate with everyone when a group is spread out like this! And this is right after we tried to regroup!
A good row, overall. I was really glad to be back in a 2x with J, since that's our priority race for Saturday morning's regatta.
After some coffee with my teammates, I went back to the boathouse to finish constructing the main "wall." I wanted to get it done before I leave to go bike touring next week. And, success!
It might not look like much, but it lets me move forward with constructing a second charging station for the walkie-talkies, which can now hang in another shoe holder next to the light charging station. Prior to the wall, there wasn't really a place to put things - you can see there's just the shed's metal outer cladding that's behind the wall. And then I can eventually start work on an updated coxbox/megaphone charging shelf.
And then I worked on just one of a jillion equipment repair projects. This one was an interesting one. Here is the footstretcher assembly out of one of the club's singles:
As you can see, the sole of the right shoe tore out.
The reason why the sole of the right shoe tore out, is because the shoe had been bolted directly through the footstretcher board, with a pair of bolts.
Most modern rowing shoes are attached to a separate plate via a set of FOUR screws, and that plate is then bolted to the footstretcher board. (of course, I recently emulated this same direct bolting technique on shoes for my own boat, heh!)
However, most likely in this instance, at some point or another there was a hunt to find a footstretcher board of the correct width/dimensions to fit into this particular boat. This footstretcher board hardly looks original (although one can certainly purchase a replacement for the original, for the mere price of $265).
And with that hunt, a challenge, because boatmakers don't care to standardize things between boat brands. So maybe the board was found, but there was no shoe plate that would work with the board. In some cases I've observed that our coach has sawed (sawn?) down footstretcher boards to get them to fit the width of the boat he needs them to go in. Sometimes that works, sometimes not, depending on what the footstretcher board is made of.
Last year I did advocate for paying the hefty sum to replace one of the other really badly bodged sets of footstretchers in one of the doubles we use and race frequently.
Anyway.
With all that information, I did find a box full of spare shoe plates, and I did find a really nice, brand-new pair of shoes among the supply stockpile, which you can see on the right in the photo above.
But do the bolt holes for the nice-looking new shoes actually line up with the bolt holes in the shoe plate I found? (note, it has to be a narrow shoe plate for this narrow boat, so that did involve quite a bit of rummaging through that parts bin).
No, of course not!
But, there was another pair of worn-out shoes in the separate, bigger "footstretcher parts and shoes" bin that DID fit the bolt holes in the plate.
So the only other remaining step was to drill yet another set of holes in the footstretcher board, so the board could accept this particular (superior IMHO) style of footstretcher plate. That poor footstretcher board, though, can only handle so many holes!
And then assemble everything, after rummaging around a whole bunch more to find some acceptable bolts, too. (don't even get me started on thread pitch differences across our equipment!!!!)
There are also some brand new shoes on order anyway, but they aren't going to arrive in time for the regatta this weekend.
So when I go home, I also need to remember to find a couple pieces of foam to insert into the heels on these worn-out shoes, so that anyone rowing the boat doesn't get their heels all cut up.
And with this project, perhaps you can begin to grasp the extent to which there is a massive, massive equipment maintenance backlog to address.
We have the exact same problem with the rowing equipment, as I initially had with the first set of bicycles I obtained for my bicycling class. Used equipment, assembled back together, will work for a little while.
Until something breaks.
And when things start to break, the nightmare begins, because none of the parts are standardized. So every repair requires that someone become the champion of that particular project, and see it through from start to finish.
With the bikes, I largely addressed this by arranging to buy a fleet. I've added more bikes since then, but the fleet is the core of the bike collection. And it has been such a relief, to be able to ride and not have to worry so much about limping the bikes along.
With the rowing equipment, I think my biggest dilemma at this point is related to communicating about this whole situation to the rowing club.
Our head coach, who has been on hiatus for 6 months now (out of town in Chicago with family), has been talking to me about this problem for *years*. But he has also clearly been incredibly thrifty and clever about bodging repairs, to the point where I'm just not sure whether any of my teammates fully understand the scope of things. I mean, I'm not sure that *I* fully understand the scope!
There's also the element that it's usually a whole lot easier to convince people to contribute towards the purchase of a shiny new boat, as compared to contributing to the upkeep of many of these older, tired shells.
But it's worth keeping up at least *some* of these older shells going, because they're the boats we have right now, and we're using many of them often multiple times in a single day.
So that's where I am, with things.
And obviously I also need to be strategic with my time, since this boat stuff is a hobby and not my profession.
It's too late for today, however.
Good practice for waiting in line at regattas! (and then also hustling once we have our turn to launch; these aspects of rowing really do cater to twitchy people like me)
It was a bit chilly, but the water was pretty calm and the current has settled down.
Getting 7 boats across lined up is a bit of a project, and we definitely aren't used to doing it.
Thankfully we only really had to do that once.
But from this photo, you can probably begin to appreciate why coaches are always trying to get their crews to bunch up together.
It's really hard to communicate with everyone when a group is spread out like this! And this is right after we tried to regroup!
A good row, overall. I was really glad to be back in a 2x with J, since that's our priority race for Saturday morning's regatta.
After some coffee with my teammates, I went back to the boathouse to finish constructing the main "wall." I wanted to get it done before I leave to go bike touring next week. And, success!
It might not look like much, but it lets me move forward with constructing a second charging station for the walkie-talkies, which can now hang in another shoe holder next to the light charging station. Prior to the wall, there wasn't really a place to put things - you can see there's just the shed's metal outer cladding that's behind the wall. And then I can eventually start work on an updated coxbox/megaphone charging shelf.
And then I worked on just one of a jillion equipment repair projects. This one was an interesting one. Here is the footstretcher assembly out of one of the club's singles:
As you can see, the sole of the right shoe tore out.
The reason why the sole of the right shoe tore out, is because the shoe had been bolted directly through the footstretcher board, with a pair of bolts.
Most modern rowing shoes are attached to a separate plate via a set of FOUR screws, and that plate is then bolted to the footstretcher board. (of course, I recently emulated this same direct bolting technique on shoes for my own boat, heh!)
However, most likely in this instance, at some point or another there was a hunt to find a footstretcher board of the correct width/dimensions to fit into this particular boat. This footstretcher board hardly looks original (although one can certainly purchase a replacement for the original, for the mere price of $265).
And with that hunt, a challenge, because boatmakers don't care to standardize things between boat brands. So maybe the board was found, but there was no shoe plate that would work with the board. In some cases I've observed that our coach has sawed (sawn?) down footstretcher boards to get them to fit the width of the boat he needs them to go in. Sometimes that works, sometimes not, depending on what the footstretcher board is made of.
Last year I did advocate for paying the hefty sum to replace one of the other really badly bodged sets of footstretchers in one of the doubles we use and race frequently.
Anyway.
With all that information, I did find a box full of spare shoe plates, and I did find a really nice, brand-new pair of shoes among the supply stockpile, which you can see on the right in the photo above.
But do the bolt holes for the nice-looking new shoes actually line up with the bolt holes in the shoe plate I found? (note, it has to be a narrow shoe plate for this narrow boat, so that did involve quite a bit of rummaging through that parts bin).
No, of course not!
But, there was another pair of worn-out shoes in the separate, bigger "footstretcher parts and shoes" bin that DID fit the bolt holes in the plate.
So the only other remaining step was to drill yet another set of holes in the footstretcher board, so the board could accept this particular (superior IMHO) style of footstretcher plate. That poor footstretcher board, though, can only handle so many holes!
And then assemble everything, after rummaging around a whole bunch more to find some acceptable bolts, too. (don't even get me started on thread pitch differences across our equipment!!!!)
There are also some brand new shoes on order anyway, but they aren't going to arrive in time for the regatta this weekend.
So when I go home, I also need to remember to find a couple pieces of foam to insert into the heels on these worn-out shoes, so that anyone rowing the boat doesn't get their heels all cut up.
And with this project, perhaps you can begin to grasp the extent to which there is a massive, massive equipment maintenance backlog to address.
We have the exact same problem with the rowing equipment, as I initially had with the first set of bicycles I obtained for my bicycling class. Used equipment, assembled back together, will work for a little while.
Until something breaks.
And when things start to break, the nightmare begins, because none of the parts are standardized. So every repair requires that someone become the champion of that particular project, and see it through from start to finish.
With the bikes, I largely addressed this by arranging to buy a fleet. I've added more bikes since then, but the fleet is the core of the bike collection. And it has been such a relief, to be able to ride and not have to worry so much about limping the bikes along.
With the rowing equipment, I think my biggest dilemma at this point is related to communicating about this whole situation to the rowing club.
Our head coach, who has been on hiatus for 6 months now (out of town in Chicago with family), has been talking to me about this problem for *years*. But he has also clearly been incredibly thrifty and clever about bodging repairs, to the point where I'm just not sure whether any of my teammates fully understand the scope of things. I mean, I'm not sure that *I* fully understand the scope!
There's also the element that it's usually a whole lot easier to convince people to contribute towards the purchase of a shiny new boat, as compared to contributing to the upkeep of many of these older, tired shells.
But it's worth keeping up at least *some* of these older shells going, because they're the boats we have right now, and we're using many of them often multiple times in a single day.
So that's where I am, with things.
And obviously I also need to be strategic with my time, since this boat stuff is a hobby and not my profession.
It's too late for today, however.
