Feedback on practice - 07AUG2009
Ciao guys!
Have a look at the pic. Notice anything?
Melissa made me send you this pic for tonight’s practice… and yes, this was our main focus of practice… QUICKER EXITS! I know I know I know… this was just us during our warm-up on our way to starting line… but, still, it doesn’t look good. Like Melissa said during practice… as everybody exits at different rate… it slows down the boat till the very last paddle is out. Keep that in mind! At tonight’s practice, we did sectional paddling where every second row, the paddler behind would put their paddle vertical behind your bench to block you whenever you pull to far back… we all did it and realize that we all pulled too far back… which makes no point since we’re not pulling anymore water at that point… Remember what Melissa said… we want the good stuff… and that’s what’s in front of you! Towards the end of practice, it made a huge difference when we exit all at the same time and paddled in synch… the boat was moving so smoothly and also, it avoids the boat from sinking. By reaching too far back, you’re not reaching fast enough the front to pull more water and gives a chance for the boat to sink… and we all know that it sucks to paddle a sinking boat! We feel heavy and sluggish! Anyways, we gotta work on that.
Also, at the end of practice, Melissa started making us work on our turns for the Quebec Cup 2km races. During the turns, for now, we’ll be paddling the exact way as we do now… unless she calls “PULL”. When she says that during a turn, this command is only for the first 3 paddlers on the left and the back 3 paddlers on the right. You guys will start paddling in a 45 degree angle while still keeping pace with the rest of the boat. For the whole boat, during the turns, the right side has to focus on long reaches while the left side had to focus on very DEEP strokes to get the boat moving. For those that were at practice tonight knows how heavy the boat feels during a turn… we need to focus on this to get the boat moving as fast as possible out of the turn… and once that we’re out of the turn… I know that this is crazy talk but it must be done… Melissa will call for a pick-up of 10 strokes right away to get to race pace again.
For all those that haven’t experienced a 2km race during the Quebec Cup with 3 turns to do during this race with 10 teams at the same time, I’ll strongly suggest that you check-out the Canadian DragonBoat Championship which will be held from 22-23 of August at the Bassin Olympic. All the top teams in Canada will be there… and for them to qualify to make it to the Wold DB Championship in Macau in 2010… they all have to do the 2km race with turns. This should be quite a show to see! And also give you a better idea what to expect for Quebec Cup in September!
Anyways, enjoy the weekend… get rested… we have practice on MONDAY!
Nancy