update for 8/23 & 24

Here are the last two days of updates. Not much to do here aside from rowing (who knew?) but that's ok as it is what we came here to do. I consolidated both days into one post. Enjoy!

August 23, 2007
Ok, I agreed to write a blog so a couple of friends stateside could keep up with the goings-on of Germany and its hosting of the FISA world championships. The first one of these was posted thanks to Igor and gave an initial update. This one will give a bit of background as well as an update. Having never done a blog and my only real journal writing was in 7th and 8th grade as part of a literature class, I make no promises that this will be awe inspiring stuff. However, I’ll do my best to update it daily and let everyone know what is going on. So, here goes.
I will quickly wrap up how the boat came to be and its time spent between trials and our departure for worlds. Bruce Smith, our coach, went through a pretty thorough and lengthy process to select the eight guys for the boat. He did a lot of seat-racing in pairs and fours to sort us out and that took up a lot of time, from mid-May til the first week in July. We had the lineup finally set July 7, which is the day before my birthday, so it was kind of like an early gift. The lineup is (from stroke to bow) Will Daly, John Nichols, Andrew Diebold, me (Jeff Forrester), Greg Ruckman, Tyler Resch, Gavin Frase, and Tim Larson. Our coxswain is Leigh Heyman. We are a great mix of international experience and naïve excitement. For three of us, this is our first US team of any kind (Tyler, Leigh, and me); for two it is their first senior Worlds team (Gavin and Andrew). Will and John were in the boat last year for their first senior team. Greg (also in the eight last year) and Tim are the experienced guys, having each gone to nine and three world, respectively. So, this line up presents numerous possibilities and we are all excited about that.
Trials was a lot of nervous energy but a very good experience because we learned how to handle adversity and, we found out, how to handle the pressure associated with this kind of racing. We took three tries to hit our time standard and the final chance was also the absolute last day we had a chance to do so. With beautiful weather and an intense focus, we did it and have tried to carry that focus to every ensuing row.
Since trials, we worked hard on finding more speed via cleaner, sharper rowing. So, while we weren’t overworked physically, Bruce expected us to be engaged and focused more so mentally and it has paid off. We’ve definitely picked up speed and confidence and are looking forward to showcasing this. For the record, though, we did still do quite a bit of hard work to be fresh on the race pace.
Ok, enough background. Here is the up-to-date stuff.
Blade work has become a huge focal point., mostly focusing on the hand motions right at the catch and release. We did some drilling where all we did while rowing was watch our hands as we took the catch or finished the stroke, seeing that we kept the movement simple and direct. The simpler, the better and it, amazingly, felt immediately better. Often times changes take some rows to make but this movement become crisper all around just from that. Super simple but effective. This drilling was done Wed. night and
we carried that blade work focus to Thursday morning when we did a 250m, a 500m, a1000m, a 500m, and a 250m piece. The first two we rolled into and went at base, about a 38-39. The thousand and last two we did off the start with the lwt quad here. The thousand was very quick but a little shakier than we’d have liked. We focused a bit more on the 500 and 250 to keep stable hands and the boat moved even better. We were definitely pleased overall with the workout. The afternoon row was just two laps still working on blade control, thinking lighter, shallow catches because we’ve been going a bit deep at pressure. After two laps of this, the starts at the end of the row felt great.
On the whole, I think everyone is geared up and ready to race. Unfortunately, with only six entries, we don’t race until Tuesday and it is only for lane allocation. We’ll see how we’ll play this one out, as lanes may be important if the wind is wrong. I’ll leave that thinking to Bruce and Leigh. It will be nice to finally line up, though, and see where we stand to some degree. Our final isn’t until Sept. 1, so we still have some time to get faster and work on rowing better.
Now for the biggest news- Leigh and Bruce painted the blades during the day Wednesday so I finally got to proudly row with US colors. I didn’t think it would be so cool, but I did get a measure of pride I didn’t anticipate. That alone has re-energized me, not that I really needed it.
That is about it for today. I’ll update again tomorrow and try to offer a bit more. Thanks for the support and well-wishes; keep ‘em coming!

August 24, 2007
This morning was some super sharp, really fast rowing that left Leigh just saying “WOW!” That is as close to speechless as you’ll get a coxswain. We did a couple of laps of working on smoother roll-ups into the catch and equally smooth feathering out of the release at the finish. Mostly the same drill of just watching our hands but also adding in trying to bury only half the blade to create an easier, lighter motion into the water. After 8k of that, we did some 10s to warm up to rate and did three full starts. This entailed the start sequence, a high 20, a 10 at a mid-range rate (41-42) and then a 10 at base or a bit above (38-39). Bruce was timing us to the 250m of each start and was getting between 41-43 seconds. Time aside, they felt phenomenal. We are learning and achieving that feeling of not hitting the catch but placing the blade and then driving like hell once we are locked on. Being patient at a 46-47 off the line used to feel almost impossible but it has now started to become a reality. Leigh’s way of calling the start and transitions helps but thinking about the drive and catch as two distinct entities has helped me get that feeling and help make the boat faster. It is awesome to still be feeling like we’re improving and getting more out of the boat. My biggest fear is that we wouldn’t continue the search for improvements but this boat seems be have ever more hunger to get better. This has made this experience that much better.
We got off the water a bit early so John and I went to the finish area by the grandstands and just watched the parade of boats going up and down the course. Today was clear and warm- absolutely gorgeous for rowing. So, we sat there and got a chance to see some rather renowned rowers going by as well as the Italian light eight. We haven’t seen much of our competition aside from them. With the course open all day, it is quite conceivable that the other crews just go earlier or later than us. It seems busy all the time. However, it was nice to see them and get a sneak peek. They weren’t doing anything at pressure but you can still tell they’re fast. This doesn’t intimidate me but makes me want to get better so that we can be faster. As the defending world champs, I am sure they know that the target is squarely on them. I just hope we can hit the bull’s eye.
That is all for today. I’ll write again tomorrow.