sculling oar for sailboat

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Ro-the Japanese sculling oar

Though not a boat per se, the ro, or Japanese sculling oar, is worth discussing as the primary means of propulsion along with the kai, or paddle, for traditional Japanese boats. Some cruising sailors in the West have adopted this oar for use in moving boats up to thirty feet long. It is a very powerful tool and easy to use once you get used to it. If you are interested in learning more about how cruising sailors have adapted the Asian sculling oar, do a Google search on the Chinese variant called the yuloh. Very little has been published on the Japanese ro.

Like much of Japanese art and technology, the ro is almost certainly a product of ancient China. A number of scholars have placed the invention of the yuloh as the Yangtze basin of south-eastern China. The late China scholar Joseph Needham identified paintings showing the sculling oar as far back as the Han Dynasty (206 BC – 220 AD), and two Japanese scholars have argued that the sculling oar may have come to Japan during one of two great migrations of Chinese culture: the introduction of rice cultivation around 100 BC; or during the Nara Period (710 – 794), when Buddhism entered Japan. I have not travelled extensively enough in China to speak with authority on the yuloh, except to say that in general the yuloh seems shorter than its Japanese cousin and is used with a much quicker cadence. As with so much of Japanese culture that came from China and Korea, the Japanese have developed their sculling oar to the point where it is now significantly different from its forebears.

Ro are almost always made of four pieces: the blade (ro-shita), the socket (ireko), the ro-ude (loom), and the handle (ro-zuku). The handle and loom are joined at an angle with a floating tenon bound with either hemp line or wire. The version I built has a floating tenon and bolts together so it can be broken down into two pieces for convenience. The joint is also slightly offset so that the longitudinal centreline of the blade is slightly askew of the handle. The most common location for the ro is to the port side of the stern of the boat, and the socket drops onto a small post (rogui) made of either hard oak or iron. The asymmetry of the handle is to move it inboard slightly from the side location of the pivot. Finally, a rope (hayao) is fastened to the bottom of the boat and a loop is thrown over the handle. On larger boats rogui are mounted on athwart-ship beams that cross the boat at the sheer.

The two main types of ro are tomo-ro (stern mounted) and waki-ro (side mounted). Varieties of Japanese oak are usually used to make ro. In the Tokyo and Osaka region white oak is used for the handle, loom and socket while red oak is used for the blade. In northern Japan a wood called asuza is used for the blade. There is an advantage to using the heavier woods in the blade as the balance of the ro is critical, and a ro with a blade that sinks is advantageous.

The geometry of the ro is critical to its success, and a myriad of factors decide an individual ro’s design. The length of the boat, the height of the rogui off the water, the height of the oarsman, and the conditions of use all have to be taken into account. The heavy section of the loom, for instance, is to give the overall ro the proper balance. Traditionally in urban areas ro and kai were not made by boatbuilders. Ro-craftsmen developed their skills over years of experience and understood their customers’ needs. In the countryside this was not a separate craft and boatbuilders did make ro and kai. It is difficult to come up with standard dimensions for ro since every boatbuilder I have talked to has a different formula. Two Japanese researchers mention a length range of 1.5 – 2.1 meters for the loom and 4.2 – 5.5 meters for the blade. A boatbuilder on Lake Biwa told me that the ratio of distance from the end of the loom to the socket and from the socket to the blade tip should be 5.4 to 10.

The drawing shows the dimensions for a ro built by one of my teachers, Mr. Kazuyoshi Fujiwara, a fourth generation boatbuilder from the Sumida-ward of Tokyo. In the 1990s he heard that the last ro-craftsman of Tokyo was retiring and Fujiwara, recognizing that loss, apprenticed with him. The teacher at the time was in his eighties and the student was in his late sixties. Fujiwara’s ro was made for a replica boat that he and I built together in 2002 . It is a chokkibune, a type of Tokyo water taxi.

Using the ro is a revelation. I have sculled the chokkibune many miles and I can say that it takes far less energy to do so than had she been powered with anything like western oars. She is a heavily built boat, over thirty feet long, yet I have sculled her fully loaded with passengers with next to no physical strain. Once one gets comfortable with the ro, the action is a forward and back lean on the balls of one’s feet, using the large muscles of the thighs more than the arms and shoulders. The most basic mistake of the beginner is to feather the blade incorrectly and generate lift instead of thrust. The ro will immediately pop off its post and it is heavy enough that it will take some moments to set it right again. I saw a rental fleet in Japan that had a wire bale looped over the ro at the socket for just this eventuality.

But once under-way the benefits of the Japanese sculling oar become apparent. First, unlike oars that spend half their time in the air on the return stroke, the ro is applying almost constant thrust. The only moment when it isn’t is the fraction of a second at either end of the stroke. The angle of the handle means that the user does not have to physically twist the blade – since the handle is not on the centreline of the blade it automatically rotates. Furthermore, the socket is carefully rounded to aid the rotation. The rope leader is always kept taut, and it counteracts the amount of twisting force. The end of the handle when sculling describes an arc limited by the rope. At slow speeds the rower has to concentrate on lifting slightly to keep the rope taut, but once blade begins to bite, its thrust keeps the handle lifted. Perhaps the most important feature of the rope is that it resists the thrust being applied by the blade. With western oars the force of the thrust is borne directly by the rower with the arms and shoulders. With the ro the thrust of the blade acts to lift the handle, a force that is held in check by the rope. It’s a good thing, since the surface area of the ro is far larger than a pair of standard oars, and a lot of thrust is being created. The only time the ro is ever lifted from the water and feathered like a western sweep is when turning. Then the handle is pushed down, the rope falls slack, and the stern is essentially rowed around. In multi-ro boats the oarsmen do not necessarily have to keep the same cadence, however the side-to-side rocking of the rower when sculling at high speed can begin to rock the boat. Because the ro works astern a boat can be navigated through a waterway just a bit wider than its own hull. Because its long blade can reach four to five feet deep, the major disadvantage of the ro is that it cannot be used in shallow waters; but then again, that is why Japan's boatmen are so expert with their paddles.

Note: This post is an abbreviated version of my article " A Different Way to Ro " published by WoodenBoat Magazine, Issue 192, September/October, 2006.

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Single Oar Sculling

This isn’t the sort of sculling done using two, ridiculously long, oars to ‘row’ a long skimpy scull.

This is the sort done with one oar, waggling it backwards and forwards over the transom.

Ok, there is more to it than just waggling the paddle.

Yes, it does take a bit of practice but this is a skill well worth acquiring .

The Oar or Paddle.

The technique..

• Making a Paddle

This is a handy way to propel a dinghy through a crowded anchorage, not only can you face forward to see where they're going but steering is easy.

It is also an efficient way to move a sailboat when the wind has dropped or any boat if the engine is playing up.

I first became intrigued with this method of propulsion when I saw large, heavy, traditional, French fishing boat being sculled out of the anchorage on Les Îles des Glénan.

When you are sculling you are exerting the propulsive power slowly and continuously making it easier to move large loads relatively easily.

If this is something you are thinking of doing with a light dinghy over short distances then a normal oar can be used quite adequately, preferably one which is at least two thirds the length of your boat.

However, there are several designs of paddle shaped especially for this technique which are easier and less tiring to use.

Perhaps the best known is the Chinese Yuloh.

Specialist sculling oars usually have longer shafts and longer blades than a rowing oar.

And more important they are angled so that virtually no wrist rotation is required.

The yuloh is usually made from two or three straight pieces set at an angle so the blade curves down into the water at an angle of about twenty five degrees.

The long blade should be shaped so that it is flat on the bottom and curved on top.

When used with the flat side down the oar reverses pitch easily at the end of each stroke.

The Chinese also attach a rope from the handle end down to the deck.

While this helps keep the oar from digging too deep, it is mainly used to help twist the oar and assist the sideways pull.

A deep oarlock will make sculling much easier for the novice as it will help overcome the beginner’s tendency to allow the oar to jump up out of the rowlock, some even use a captive rowlock or a rope tie-down.

If you watch an expert, sculling looks easy.

However there is a knack to it which requires patience and practice to get it right.

There are two basic methods;

• where you start off with the oar blade vertical in the water
• and where you start with it flat.

Both methods use the same basic principle.

The oar blade is swept back and forth across the stern with the leading edge always angled downwards.

For the beginner and anyone using a standard oar the first method is the easiest to master (which is why I do it this way).

This vertical or slalom stroke also makes it easier to steer the boat and there is less tendency for the oar to jump out of the rowlock.

With this method the lower edge of the oar blade always leads.

So start with the blade vertical then use your wrists to turn the oar blade then push it so that bottom edge is leading.

At the end of the stroke reverse the twist so that the bottom edge is facing the opposite way then begin the reverse stroke.

To begin with just use a small amount of twist until you become more adept at reversing the pitch at the end of the stroke.

As you get more confident begin to give the blade more twist so you get more forward momentum and less zigzag.

With practice, you'll find that you can steer by varying the pitch on alternate strokes.

The second method with the blade starting in the horizontal position is the one most commonly used with a specialist oar.

This is a much more powerful and efficient stroke.

The stroke begins with the flat side of the blade facing down.

It is then twisted and the lower of the edges is always the leading edge as you push from side to side.

With either method, the pitch of the blade must be changed as the direction of thrust is altered otherwise the oar will come out of the water.

With the Chinese yuloh, one hand holds the oar end at head eight while the other hand uses the lanyard to move it from side to side.

The yuloh’s lanyard also puts the required twist on the oar so little or no wrist action is required to put the pitch on the blade.

Sculling is not as fast as rowing, however it is a skill worth learning.

It is a handy way to thread your way through a crowded harbor or narrow creek.

And it is an easier way to move a heavy boat in an emergency.

All it takes is a little bit of practice.

Building a Sculling Paddle

This is how I recently built a quick, easy and rough sculling paddle.

The bend in the shaft at roughly 1/3 of the distance from the handle end and at roughly about 20 degrees from the blade.

The bend was created while laminating the outer strips to the central shaped piece.

Below is how the paddle is used.

It can also be used very easily one handed by just holding the handle.

It is an easier way to move a heavy boat in an emergency.

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Sculling Oars (yuloh)

• Thread starter Perry Solheim
• Start date Jul 4, 2016
• Tags sculling oar yuloh
• Forums for All Owners
• Ask All Sailors

Perry Solheim

Anyone build/install a sculling oar (yuloh, actually) on their full keel boat? Worth it? (I'm a woodworker, among my many hobbies and have a large well equipped shop, except for a lathe that I could use to build a wooden oar with...). I'm looking for tips on where to locate the oar lock (can't be close to center because of the tiller and rudder, but my IF is also very narrow so if I get too far to the starboard, I run the risk of banging the life line stanchions...) If you use one, how far do you tend to move the oar back and forth? How much space should I allow? Also, does the line that attaches to the deck need to be directly below the center of the oar, in line with the oar lock? Thanks for the help. I'm excited to be in the forum and actually have a boat to ask real questions about.  

I don't have your answers, Perry, but I'm also interested in a yuloh as back-up propulsion for my little catboat. I too have the woodworking skills and shop to easily build one. Looking forward to having someone with some practical experience chime in.  

Scott T-Bird

I think you'll find lots of experience and help with diesel mechanics but not so much with a sculling oar! But you never know ... give it some time!  

Scott T-Bird said: I think you'll find lots of experience and help with diesel mechanics but not so much with a sculling oar! But you never know ... give it some time! Click to expand

Ukeluthier said: P Problem is, diesel mechanics generally aren't aboard when the auxiliary quits on a windless Chesapeake day. I'm pretty good with a wrench myself and keep my auxiliary well-maintained, but I'm a self-reliant "belt-and-suspenders" man who thinks a low-tech back-up makes sense for a smallish boat. I keep a canoe paddle in one of the cockpit lockers, but that doesn't cut it for any significant distance. I suspect there are a few more of us Luddites out there. Click to expand

My experience using a single sculling oar dates back to about 1973-75 when I taught Rowing Merit Badge at a BSA camp in northern Wis. However that was on a 16 foot rowboat. You will want the oar lock mounted off center but on a rowboat that was primarily for balance, on our boat probably enough to clear the rudder and tiller is fine. Your range of motion is probably limited to an arm length plus a little more if you lean into it. Not sure what you mean by the line that attaches to the deck? Our sculling oar lock was a U shape and the oar had a leather wrap about 8 inches with a leather collar that helped keep the oar from slipping down the oar lock. I have also seen some type of loop on the oar that fit over a post on the stern rather than using an oar lock. I did a quick google search (images) and saw a variety of ways to hold the oar in place. One pix of a ~25 foot sailboat looked like the captain was using a small telephone pole. There is also some YouTube videos of folks facing aft and working the heck out of the oar with both hands. The proper position is feet planted firmly on the deck, facing the side with the forward foot pointing somewhat in the direction of travel. Your aft hand working the oar and the forward hand holding your favorite adult beverage. Don’t forget to send pictures of the oar and a video of you gliding effortlessly through an anchorage.  

brazenarticle

check out this article for some info on making and using a yuloh http://triloboats.blogspot.com/2012/04/windless-running-on-grits.html  

brazenarticle said: check out this article for some info on making and using a yuloh http://triloboats.blogspot.com/2012/04/windless-running-on-grits.html Click to expand

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Everything You Need to Know About Sculling Oars

by Angus Rowboats 8 Comments

There’s plenty of information outlining the benefits of a sliding seat rowing system for recreation, but there is very little information about the oars required.  For newcomers to the sport, it can be confusing figuring out what is needed. We decided it was time to write a comprehensive page outlining everything you need to know about sculling oars.

Oar Feathering

Unlike fixed seat rowing, it is important that sculling oars are feathered (turned horizontal to the water) on the return stroke.  This is not just for decreasing wind resistance, but it reduces the chance of the blades catching the water, since there is generally less clearance than with a fixed seat system.

Having the flat edge of the shaft abutting the flat edge of the oarlock not only provides a stable defined angle, but it also helps distribute the pressure across the shaft.  A round oar shaft (only used in fixed seat rowing) generally has a very small contact point with the oarlock which increases the chances of it breaking and causing excessive wear.  As you can see in the image (right) of a typical fixed seat oarlock system, the contact point between the shaft and oarlock is minimal, and blade angle is ambiguous with regards to shaft orientation in oarlock.

Oar Sleeves and Buttons

With the advent of carbon fiber and fiberglass oars, it was easier and stronger to manufacture oars with round shafts.  This meant that at the location of the oarlock, is was necessary to install a sleeve (see image to right) that replicates the shape of traditional oar shaft for proper action in the oarlock.

Properly designed and shaped wooden sculling oars do not require sleeves since the oar shaft is already the correct shape for ideal feathering action.   

Hollow Shaft Wooden Oars

An alternative to expensive carbon/fiberglass oars is constructing your own wooden sculling oars.  These should not be confused with regular wooden oars, as there is a world of difference in weight, shape and specs.  The shaft should be hollow to reduce weight, and it should not be round.  Sculling oars are made from lightweight strong woods such as spruce. Generally, construction costs range from $50-$200. We sell plans in our online store for hollow shaft oars.  Click here for more information. There are also a few manufacturers in the U.K. that produce completed wooden oars, however, costs, including shipping to North America are over $1000/pair.

Two-Part Oars

 Sculling oars are approximately 9.5' in length.  While this is ideal for rowing, they immediately become unwieldy for transporting or storing.  A solution for this is to use two-part oars that break in half with a ferrule.  Advanced manufacturing techniques now allow this option with minimum weight penalty.  If the budget allows, two part oars will make life much easier on and off the water.

Where to Purchase Sculling Oars?

There are a number of companies in North America (including our own) offering good quality sculling oars, and we list them below.  When comparing pricing, be sure to include shipping costs, as one-part oars are subject to extreme oversize penalties.  

One-Part Sculling Oars:

• Chesapeake Light Craft

Two-Part Sculling Oars

• Red Beard Sailing
• Angus Rowboats (our company)

Rowing Geometry

For information on positioning of the oarlocks, sliding seat, foot braces, etc, please visit our rowing geometry page .

Angus Rowboats

8 responses.

July 04, 2018

Having built the Oxford Wherry, I am looking for a set of Sculling oars. The length required is 9’ 6”. If anyone has a used set please send me a note. Ideally a Concept2 set would be preferred.

Paul Correll

October 28, 2016

Please let me know where to purchase buttons for the leather wrapped hollow oars that we have constructed from your design. Thanks, Paul

Your entire story and website are fantastic and very inspiring. I keep going back to the build gallery, your oars are beautiful. I built 2 pair of oars and I was pretty proud of them but now after seeing yours its time for an evolution. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OqDjFy8z08U Thank you My oars do work and got me on the water and hopefully have inspired some backyard builders to go for it. Thanks again

We will have buttons available in our online store next month.

Ideally, you’ll be using clear sitka spruce in ten foot lengths. Good pine can also be used. Heavier woods such as fir are good for strength, but will make the oar heavier.

I’m interested in both your sliding seat and rigger system and the wooden oars. Can you tell me what wood I’ll need (type and dimensions) to build these? If the wood is not available locally (Ohio), can you recommend an internet soruce?

@ Bob Cramer – if you still have those wood oars I would be interested in them. Please email me: [email protected]

Thanks, Guy S.

I have a pair of new 9’6" Piantedosi sculling oars for sale. Not sure what they are worth – will sell for best offer.

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All about the waters of the rondout creek and the hudson river.

Single oar sculling

Came upon this interesting painting by Wilson Hepple “King’s Meadows Island and Boats on the Tyne” (early 1900’s) and notice the boat being both rowed at bow and sculled at the same time at the stern.

Read more about it in:

Sculling over the stern

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Sculling sailboats?

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So, I've got a question, and an anecdote. I've heard stories of sailboats, even over 35 feet, being sculled into ports, without motor. Most of these stories come from either Bermuda or China, consequently (and seem dated). In fact, in China there is a saying "a scull equals 3 oars", though this is beside the point... Has anyone ever seen this done? I'm sure it's not easy, but it seems invaluable, especially if you're minus the iron jib. So basically my question is whether this is a practical thing to do for a moderate/heavy displacement 27 foot boat, full keel with cutaway for-foot, attached rudder, or any boat for that matter. That and I basically want to see what everyone thinks of this idea, because if you can still maneuver the boat it seems pretty ideal. Thanks.  

Yes, it can be done. But you need a fairly long oar to do it with and a set of thole pins or some other notch for the oar on the transom of the boat.  

A dockmate does it quite often, first time I offered him my dinghy engine and found out he does it for recreation, as Dog said he uses a very long oar and a couple thole pins. I'm not sure what his boat was when first built but it is now a 27' junk rigged ketch with a very large unstayed wooden mainmast. I swear that my description of this boat is accurate.  

I've sculled both of my boats with the rudder at various times. It is very slow but it works.  

There's a group of guys out in Bellingham WA call the Oar Club. They sail boats of all types (from a J30 to a Atkin double ender) sans engine and use sweeps and sculling oars for propulsion when there is no wind. The guy who started the group, Jerome Fitzgerald, wrote a great book called "The Purpose of Sailing" in which he details just how efficiently one can handle a boat with no engine. If you're interested in this stuff it's definitely a worthy read. Personally, I'm currently looking into a sculling or for my engineless Triton.  

redstripesailor said: There's a group of guys out in Bellingham WA call the Oar Club. . Click to expand...

Here is a article on sculling. Check it out : Sculling One  

When I was a teenager, our family spent summer vacations in an old farm house on Gwynn's Island, VA, on the Chesapeake Bay. We were adopted by a local waterman by the name of Fossie Smith. He taught me a lot about life on the Bay. One of the things he did was to take the time to teach me how to scull an 18' crab skiff. It's an absolutely Zen way to propel a small boat. You have to do it to understand that.  

Absolutely. Sadly not many of us have 18' crab boats. A mate of ours has an absolutely lovely 'peapod'. I've never sculled her but she is a joy to row. To get the most out of sculling (or rowing for that matter) something better than the average yacht tender is required. Its most unfortunate that for most of us these days our tenders are rubbish when it comes to rowing.  

Here is a link for the Pardey discussion: The Self-Sufficient Sailor - Google Book Search  

Twice now the stupid air pump that runs on dead dinosaurs quit. Both times, I was in the harbor with no wind. Stands to reason, that's the only place I'd run the engine anyway. Day before yesterday, there was not a breath of wind near the harbor, and the bucket of demented parts quit with me 600 feet from the slip. So I sculled home. Sculling involves moving the tiller back and forth like a fish moves a fin. You move it rapidly in one direction, then slowly in the opposite – just like you would move your arms while swimming under water. You change course by moving the tiller only from the center to the opposite side in which you desire to turn. I enjoyed moving along slowly, propelling myself with the tiller. It works, but it's slow. It took me over an hour to get to the mouth of the harbor. I'm not complaining. I believe this technique is possible on a boat having a wheel instead of a tiller – but considering most boats with wheels require more than a full revolution of the wheel to move the rudder through a full side-to-side deflection, the technique would rapidly exhaust anyone using it. Chalk up another advantage of tillers over wheels. So once I was in the harbor channel, all these boats passed me. While passing, one skipper asked: "Are you aground?" I said, no, I'm just sculling back to my slip. He looked at me as if I had grown two heads. A sailboat came along (under power) and asked if I needed a tow. I said: "No. Do you?" I then laughed and thanked him, and explained that I was moving along fine by sculling. He said: "Doing what?" I repeated my explanation. He said: "Don't you know that's impossible without a special mount for a long oar?" And I said: "Gee, I wish you'd told me that before I'd sculled my boat this far." I got it all the way into the harbor and into my slip. The same gentleman was standing on the neighboring dock watching me round the corner, turn 90 degrees right, line up with the slip, and propel my boat ever-so-slowly into its berth. He was all bug-eyed at my violation of the laws of physics. Good thing there weren't any physics cops to catch me. I sail a Pearson Ariel. It's 25 feet 7 inches overall, and 3,500 pounds gross. For sculling, I believe that size doesn't matter, but patience does. Your actual mileage may vary.  

patrickbryant said: Twice now the stupid air pump that runs on dead dinosaurs quit. Both times, I was in the harbor with no wind. Stands to reason, that's the only place I'd run the engine anyway. Day before yesterday, there was not a breath of wind near the harbor, and the bucket of demented parts quit with me 600 feet from the slip. So I sculled home. Sculling involves moving the tiller back and forth like a fish moves a fin. You move it rapidly in one direction, then slowly in the opposite - just like you would move your arms while swimming under water. You change course by moving the tiller only from the center to the opposite side in which you desire to turn. I enjoyed moving along slowly, propelling myself with the tiller. It works, but it's slow. It took me over an hour to get to the mouth of the harbor. I'm not complaining. I believe this technique is possible on a boat having a wheel instead of a tiller - but considering most boats with wheels require more than a full revolution of the wheel to move the rudder through a full side-to-side deflection, the technique would rapidly exhaust anyone using it. Chalk up another advantage of tillers over wheels. So once I was in the harbor channel, all these boats passed me. While passing, one skipper asked: "Are you aground?" I said, no, I'm just sculling back to my slip. He looked at me as if I had grown two heads. A sailboat came along (under power) and asked if I needed a tow. I said: "No. Do you?" I then laughed and thanked him, and explained that I was moving along fine by sculling. He said: "Doing what?" I repeated my explanation. He said: "Don't you know that's impossible without a special mount for a long oar?" And I said: "Gee, I wish you'd told me that before I'd sculled my boat this far." I got it all the way into the harbor and into my slip. The same gentleman was standing on the neighboring dock watching me round the corner, turn 90 degrees right, line up with the slip, and propel my boat ever-so-slowly into its berth. He was all bug-eyed at my violation of the laws of physics. Good thing there weren't any physics cops to catch me. I sail a Pearson Ariel. It's 25 feet 7 inches overall, and 3,500 pounds gross. For sculling, I believe that size doesn't matter, but patience does. Your actual mileage may vary. Click to expand...

Atom Voyages | Improvement Projects, Page 3 It's called a Yuloh in China.  

Of course, sculling with the rudder tends to be possible only in fairly benign conditions....any sort of contrary current or wind and you're toast.  

I've never sculled. I did row my previous two boats (20', one ton; 26', four tons) when necessary. Usually I just waited for a breeze. Rowing them wasn't hard, there was no point in trying to go fast, a steady stroke yielded half a knot. I made a long oar from a piece of spruce staging plank.  

I used to row my Folkboat, which did not have an engine. I had a single long sweep which had a loop of line that I tossed over a winch and rowed facing forward. Once up to speed it was pretty easy to keep moving. I would tie the helm slightly over and then varied the speed of my stroke to hold a course. I have tried sculling bigger boats on a number of occasions and its not that efficient without a properly shaped oar, and I found it hard on the wrists having to rotate the blade under load. I would not suggest sculling a boat with its rudder as a regular means of transport since it wears out the pindles and gudgeons or the rudder post prematurely. Jeff  

Another way to do it is to fix the rudder amidships and rool the boat from side to side. It works on racing dinghys  

I'll have to try that, but... only first in a very private setting. Given the amount of attention I got from other boaters by just moving the tiller back and forth to move along, I suspect that their seeing me running repeatedly back and forth across the deck from one beam to the other might get me locked up for psychiatric observation. I've found sculling with the rudder to also be a good way to rescue my boat when she's caught in irons - while keeping the sailing pure of noisy smelly beasts with propellers.  

I've sculled my 21 foot trailer sailer boat. On one trip I found I'd left the rudder home and used the scull oar as a repalcement. It worked. For my 29 ft Cal, I have 10 ft oars and can row it. They need to be at least that log to reach the water. I think the Pardeys just rowed with a single oar with thier first boat. worked fine and was a simple arrangement  

While it is a very neat way to move a boat about for short distances, it is incredibly tiring to move a big boat at any speed or for any real distance. As Jeff mentioned, it can be hard on the wrists. The real advantage to me is that you can see where you are going and you can fit in between docks barely wider than your boat. Personally, I prefer to row than to scull a boat. I can make the boat go much faster and it is much more pleasant. I leave sculling for the tight quarters maneuvering (be careful, some sculling setups make it hard to stop or go backwards while it is easy with others, it all depends on how much you can pivot the oar).  

Klem (or other rowers of smallish sailboats..) How do you set up the boat for rowing? I can't quite work out what you do for oar locks or where one would sit. Can you explain? I used to scull home all the time in my Beetle Cat... it had one of those huge barn door rudders. Chris  

How you set it up is really a function of the boat. The critical dimensions in it are the seat height, oarlock height, distance between oarlocks and oar length. Things like the fore and aft placement of the seat and oarlocks do matter but are not as important. Usually the first thing to figure out is where you can put oarlocks. If you have a cockpit coaming, it is usually an easy place to bolt on a set. I have also seen people who make a standoff block that bolts through the deck and has an oarlock on it. For boats that don't plan to row a lot, you can wrap a line around the oar and the jib winches (assuming you have them) and it works okay. Next, you need to figure out where you can sit. Usually a removable seat across the cockpit seats or on top of the centerboard trunk works best. If it isn't fastened down, this will allow you to play around with fore and aft position. The height is important and easiest to figure out sitting in the boat with the oars in the oarlocks. You want the oar handle to be somewhere around shoulder height with the blade just fully buried. If you always row in calm water, you can have it a bit lower but if you row in rough water, you need to keep it high so that the blades don't hit the waves on the recovery. I hope that this helps.  

Exactly.  

I have an engineless 8 ton 29ft gaffrigged cutter. I converted my 5 meter long sweep to a 6 meter long yuloh after learning it was better for my boat. It works like a charm. Anyone want to know the process, write me. It was a long research, but well worth it. Sweeps are good for lighter boats, and yulohs are better for heavier boats. Jeff H is right about it being hard on your wrists, after a few sessions, Popeye comes to mind. A well built and rigged yuloh is easy enough for a 15 year old to use. Engineless sailing requires a different mindset. The rules of nature make you take on a whole new perspective towards it.  

Here is a page on how to make the oar locks and rowing a bigger full keel boat A Pearson Ariel Page And here's one on making a yuloh for any boat $10 Yuloh - Cheap introduction to "scientific sculling."  

The 10usd page has pretty good info. I found that one when I made my yuloh. If you follow his advice, I'd add a sacrificial block with drilled out holes lashed to the pivot spot on the oar. If you don't, the hole in the oar will wear out, then you have to build a new oar. The sacrificial block is easier to replace. Cheers  

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Oars for different boat types

What changes are needed when doing big or small boats – length / inboard.

01:00 It’s all about gearing.

How long are your oars and what is the ratio for the outboard to the inboard? Small boats versus large boats. You have to carry your share of the total mass of the hull, riggers and oars. In a single scull you are carrying around 14-17kg. As the boat gets bigger, you carry less mass because it’s shared between more people. If you have a bigger boat – you can afford a heavier gearing on the oars.

Coaches try to give each athlete a consistent load to move the boat so you don’t have to work a lot harder in small boats compared to big boats. They adjust the rigging to make this broadly consistent.

03:00 So you should be able to rate a similar strokes per minute almost regardless of which boat type you are rowing in. Generally people rate higher in larger boats.

03:50 The span and spread affects the load.

Last week we reviewed the arc through which the oar tip moves each stroke. You want a wider span on a smaller boat (single = 160 cm) but in a quad it may be tighter 159 cm. Sweep spread is measured from the mid point of the hull out to the pin and these will be wider for smaller boats.

05:15 The oar length

You have to be strong enough to move the oar past the fulcrum. A 1k race is around 110 strokes and you need to be able to deliver each stroke to a similar power. For most clubs you will find that sculling oar lengths – sculls will be set at a length of 287 – 288 cm long Sweep 370 – 374 cm. These rigs are what you expect for younger rowers…. and oars get passed around the club and the lengths aren’t changed. Masters needs are different from younger athletes. We need shorter oars and sculls.

07:20 Jim Dreher invented the adjustable length oar – the story behind the invention.

10:00 Load on the body from the blade

Masters are a hugely divergent age and strength group of athletes. Increase the load for younger masters, tailwinds and for beginners. Decrease the load for older athletes or it’s a headwind. The more experienced are more dextrous and can cope with a higher load and can rate higher. You have to be able to put the oar in the water at the same speed the boat is moving past that part of water.

13:00 Rig your own boat to suit you

How long are your oars and span/spread? How old are you, how fit are you? Rigging for Masters webinar – Volker Nolte has a detailed chart for oar lengths and span/spread for masters. He considers most masters to row on much too heavy a gearing.

If you are older you probably want to decrease your load. When buying oars and sculls the spoon size and shaft weight / flexibility are different options you can choose, Cut an oar shaft in half – the internal diameter isn’t spherical – there are more layers of carbon on the front and back edge. This gives more or less rigidity / flex to the oar shaft. The tensional stiffness in the shaft comes from the thicker carbon which is on the front / back of the shaft facing the direction of travel when the oar is square in the water.

Buy the Rigging for Masters webinar and get Volker’s oar and scull charts.

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The Basics of Sculling: What is it and How to Do It

What is sculling? This is a question that many people have asked, and it’s not surprising. So what are the basics of sculling? Sculling is a type of rowing that can be done in a variety of different ways, making it a versatile form of exercise. In this article, we will explore what sculling is and how to get into it. We’ll also take a look at the different variations of sculling and see which one might be right for you!

Table of Contents

-The Basics of Sculling: What is it?

Have you ever seen someone rowing a boat with two oars? That’s called sculling. Sculling is a method of propulsion in watercraft that uses oars to provide thrust in addition to the primary means of propulsion, such as sails or motors. Unlike rowing, which requires the use of both hands, sculling can be done with one hand.

This makes it ideal for smaller craft such as canoes and kayaks. Sculling is also used in racing, particularly in shell or skiff racing. In order to move forwards, the sculler must angle the blades of the oars so that they act like paddles. They then push against the water, propelling the craft forwards. Sculling is a great way to get around on the water and can be a lot of fun too!

– The different variations of sculling.

Sculling is a method of rowing where each rower has two oars, one in each hand. This gives the rower more control over the boat and allows for a more efficient stroke. Sculling can be done with either one or two people in the boat, and there are a variety of different sculling boats available. The most common type of sculling boat is the single scull, which is rowed by one person.

There are also double sculls, which are rowed by two people, and quad sculls, which are rowed by four people. In addition, there are sweep boats, which have only one oar per person. These boats are typically rowed by four or eight people. Sculling is a great way to get out on the water and enjoy some exercise. There are many different sculling boats available, so there is sure to be one that is perfect for you.

– How to get into sculling.

Sculling is a great way to get an intense workout while enjoying the peacefulness of being on the water. If you’re interested in getting into sculling, there are a few things you need to know. First, you’ll need to find a good spot to row. Look for a calm body of water with little to no current. You’ll also need to make sure you have the proper equipment.

A sculling boat is long and narrow, and it has two oars that are attached to the boat at both the bow and stern. You can usually find boats and oars for rent at your local rowing club or boathouse. Once you have your boat and oars, it’s time to start rowing! Sit in the middle of the boat with your feet tucked under the straps.

Grasp the oars with your hands, and then push off from the shore. As you start rowing, keep your back straight and your arms parallel to your body. Remember to breathe evenly as you row; inhale through your nose and exhale through your mouth. Sculling is a great way to get a full-body workout, so go ahead and give it a try!

– Should people start with sweep rowing before sculling?

People often ask me which is better, sweep rowing or sculling ? And my answer is always the same: it depends on what you’re looking for. If you want a more challenging workout, then sculling is the way to go. But if you’re just starting out, then sweep rowing is a great way to get your feet wet. So which should you start with? Here’s a quick rundown of the pros and cons of each.

Sweep rowing is a great way to get introduced to the sport of rowing. It’s relatively easy to learn and doesn’t require as much coordination as sculling. Plus, you can usually find a group to row with, which makes it more fun than going solo. However, sweep rowing can be quite repetitive and doesn’t provide the same full-body workout as sculling.

Sculling, on the other hand, is a great workout but can be difficult to master. It takes quite a bit of practice to learn how to coordinate your arms and legs, but once you get the hang of it, it’s an incredibly rewarding experience. Sculling also allows you to go at your own pace, so if you want a more relaxed experience, you can go slower. But if you’re looking for a challenge, then you can really pick up the pace.

25 Bodyweight Exercises to Help You Row Better: No Weights or Equipment Necessary!

Q: What is sculling?

A: Sculling is a method of rowing where each rower has two oars, one in each hand. This gives the rower more control over the boat and allows for a more efficient stroke.

Q: What type of boats can be used for sculling?

A: The most common type of sculling boat is the single scull, which is rowed by one person. There are also double sculls, which are rowed by two people, and quad sculls, which are rowed by four people. In addition, there are sweep boats, which have only one oar per person.

Q: Where is a good place to go sculling?

A: Look for a calm body of water with little to no current. You’ll also need to make sure you have the proper equipment. A sculling boat is long and narrow, and it has two oars that are attached to the boat at both the bow and stern.

Q: How do I start sculling?

A: First, you’ll need to find a good spot to row. Look for a calm body of water with little to no current. You’ll also need to make sure you have the proper equipment. A sculling boat is long and narrow, and it has two oars that are attached to the boat at both the bow and stern. You can usually find boats and oars for rent at your local rowing club or boathouse.

Once you have your boat and oars, it’s time to start rowing! Sit in the middle of the boat with your feet tucked under the straps. Grasp the oars with your hands, and then push off from the shore. As you start rowing, keep your back straight and your arms parallel to your body. Remember to breathe evenly as you row; inhale through your nose and exhale through your mouth. Sculling is a great way to get a full-body workout, so go ahead and give it a try!

Q: Is sculling better than sweep rowing?

A: It depends on what you’re looking for. If you want a more challenging workout, then sculling is the way to go. But if you’re just starting out, then sweep rowing is a great way to get your feet wet.

Q: What are the benefits of sculling?

A: Sculling is a great way to get a full-body workout. It’s also a great way to relax and clear your mind. And because it’s low-impact, it’s easy on your joints. So whether you’re looking for a challenging workout or just a way to relax, give sculling a try!

Q: Are there any downsides to sculling?

A: The only downside to sculling is that it can be difficult to learn. It takes quite a bit of practice to master the coordination between your arms and legs. But once you get the hang of it, it’s an incredibly rewarding experience. So if you’re up for a challenge, give sculling a try!

Q: How do I become a better sculler?

A: The best way to become a better sculler is to practice, practice, practice! There’s no substitute for time on the water. But there are also some things you can do on land to improve your technique. First, make sure you have the proper equipment. A sculling boat is long and narrow,

Q: What should I wear while sculling?

A: You’ll want to dress for the weather and water conditions. If it’s cold out, make sure to layer up. And if you’re going to be in the sun, make sure to put on sunscreen. You’ll also want to wear shoes that can get wet, such as sneakers or sandals. And finally, don’t forget your life jacket!

Q: What are the different types of sculling?

A: There are two main types of sculling: single sculling and double sculling. Single sculling is when you row by yourself, using two oars. Double sculling is when you row with a partner, each using one oar. There are also variations of double sculling, such as pairs and fours. So if you’re looking for a more challenging workout, try single or double sculling. And if you want to row with a group, try pairs or fours.

Friday, July 26

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‘A pretty tough group of hardass women’: The women who propelled Princeton rowing to Olympic glory

Carol Brown ’75 and Janet Youngholm ’75 rowed in a pair to qualify for the 1974 World Championships.

Photo courtesy of princeton rowing.

When Carol Brown ’75 arrived at Princeton in 1971, she was not an athlete. Five years later, Brown would go on to row for Team USA in the Montreal Olympics , becoming the first of 16 female Princetonian rowers to do so. 

The summer before arriving on campus, she received a letter in the mail from Amy Richland ’73, a transfer student from Smith College who was starting a rowing team. At the time, the only other women’s sports at the University were tennis and field hockey. Richland had individually mimeographed, stamped, and addressed a letter to each female member of the Class of 1975, trying to sell them on the merits of crew. The letter sparked Brown’s curiosity — particularly its closing line, which read, “The way I figure it, you wouldn’t be coming to Princeton if you liked to do things the easy way.”

So, in the fall of ’71, Brown went to the first team practice, along with many other women intrigued by the invitation. At that point, all she knew about rowing was that it involved “these long boats with long oars.” She would soon learn everything else about the storied sport.

“You’re not going to get rid of us”: Equipment challenges in the early days of women’s rowing at Princeton

“It’s a big horror story,” Brown said, speaking to the trouble the women's rowing team faced accessing equipment.

That first season, women were forbidden from the boathouse and could not be seen while the men were present, so they needed to finish rowing each morning before the men arrived at 7 a.m. There was no women’s locker room nor bathroom. The coach — a grad student named Al Piranian GS ’74 who was training for the 1972 Olympics as a lightweight rower — could only work part time.  

Some were dissuaded by the harsh rowing conditions.

“When it got dark and wet and cold,” Brown said, “a lot of people drifted off.” Almost all of these women were complete beginners to the sport.

But there were also those who Brown dubbed “a pretty tough group of hard-ass women” who were determined to stick it out. She explained, “The more [they] said no, the more we said ‘BS, you’re not going to get rid of us.’” 

In addition to coaching, Piranian also worked a full time job.

“It was out of the goodness of his heart, with no pay and no equipment,” Brown explained. The team needed to hold a bake sale to buy him a rain suit and megaphone. And when Piranian couldn’t make practice, he would leave instructions for Mimi Lyman ’76, a coxswain, to lead the workouts. 

“There was no history of all these sports, so you could just try whatever you wanted,” Lyman explained.

With the advent of women's collegiate sports there was a lot of flexibility for young athletes. Lyman appreciated that she did not have to commit to just one sport, as many athletes do nowadays. Similarly, Brown also started and captained the first women’s swimming team, while another teammate, Janet Youngholm ’75, started and captained the women’s basketball team. Lyman herself joined a new women’s ice hockey team. 

Because of her small stature at 5 feet 1 inch, Lyman became a coxswain, responsible for steering the boat.

“I thought it’d be nice to finally be the right size for something,” Lyman said. She was also a trained pilot, so steering the boat came easily to her. For Lyman, landing the 60-foot boat on the dock felt “kind of like landing an airplane.”

Though Lyman was a natural, she still wasn’t sure how she felt about the sport. Because boats were not yet equipped with electronic magnification, she had to yell through a megaphone, leading to a hoarse voice.

“A lot of the year, I could just shout, but I couldn’t talk.”

Though she considered leaving the team, there was nobody else who could take over from her as a coxswain. By her senior year, Lyman was a co-captain.

When this team of inexperienced female rowers first formed, nobody dreamed of making it to the Olympics. But their coach told them early on that women’s rowing had been added to the program for the 1976 Games in Montreal — five years out from the team’s formation.

“Any of you could be on that team,” he told them. 

Brown recalled the team’s incredulous response.

“We were all like, ‘What are you smoking?’” In their minds, an Olympian needed to start training for the games from childhood. The idea seemed laughable then, but as it turned out, the 1976 U.S. women’s rowing team would comprise women who were new to rowing all across the country, including Princeton.

“Walking into the stadium with the whole world cheering for you”: The first of Princeton’s female rowers hit Olympic grounds in Montreal

For her first three years at Princeton, Brown didn’t think about her Olympic potential.

“I was just racing as Princeton, learning how to row, and getting a little more access to the boathouse,” she said.

Then, in the 1974 Nationals, Brown rowed in a pair with her teammate Janet Youngholm. They won, qualifying them for the World Championships that summer. 

Both women had summer jobs, didn’t have coaches, and would need to pay their own way to the competition. So naturally, they abandoned their summer jobs and returned to Princeton, where they found a men’s coach who was willing to work with them. At Reunions, they walked around holding an oar and a donation hat, raising enough to fund their journey to the championships. 

There, Brown and Youngholm finished fifth, becoming the only U.S. boat to reach the finals. Brown said that she thought at the time that she should start taking rowing more seriously. So, when Brown had the opportunity to participate in the first women’s national team training camp the summer after she graduated in 1975, she took it.

“It kind of all fit together,” noted Brown. 

She remained at Princeton over the summer, working multiple jobs and training with the Olympic coach. Both Brown and Youngholm were invited to the Olympic tryout camp; Brown made the team in the eight boat, while Youngholm did not. But Lyman did make the cut as a coxswain of the four.

“Both of us went to Montreal as the first two Tiger women Olympians,” Brown said. 

Everyone on the team had just begun rowing a few years before.

“We were not technically a really good boat, but we were tough, competitive,” Brown explained.

Other teams, like East Germany and Russia, had been training for much longer. Many of these athletes were later discovered to have been using performance-enhancing steroids.

“We didn’t know at the time that we weren’t supposed to beat them,” Brown said. “We didn’t beat them, but we gave it our all.”

In 1976, Lyman came in sixth place , and Brown walked away with a bronze medal . Brown went on to make the 1980 and 1984 teams, though because the United States boycotted the 1980 Olympics, she only competed in 1984. By then, the next generation of Princeton women rowers had already begun to join her.

“A testament to unwavering dedication”: The persisting legacy of Olympian Princeton women’s rowers 

By the time Anne Marden ’81 arrived on campus in fall 1976, Brown and Lyman had already made Olympic history. Now, the crew team was more established, and Marden knew she wanted to be a part of it. Having rowed in high school, she was eager to continue the sport in college, and she arrived just in time for the team to be getting a full-time coach — Kris Korzeniowski.

Anne Marden rowing a Pocock Single at her first Nationals, 1978.

Courtesy of anne marden.

At winter training that year, Korzeniowski gave the team a bench throw test. Though most people only managed 60 or 70 repetitions, Marden, who was on the short side at 5 feet 7 inches, reached 300, at which point Korzeniowski told her to stop.

For Marden and the coach, “It was a wakeup call that I could be as good as someone who was six feet tall, that I really could be a good rower.” 

Though women had been competing in college, national, and Olympic rowing for over five years, Marden explained that the playing field remained unequal.

“We got the worst boats, the heaviest boats, the cheapest coach … the laundry list keeps going,” Marden said.

But by 1978, she was a sculler in the World Championships. She then competed on the U.S. team for 14 years — from 1978 to 1992 — with only a few breaks. She also found a way to integrate her academic and athletic interests at Princeton, winning an economics senior thesis prize for her analysis of the most important factors required for athletes to produce an Olympic gold medal. 

Marden herself went on to win two Olympic silver medals — for quad sculls in 1984 and single sculls in 1988. Marden also participated in the 1992 Olympics, where she fell ill and didn’t compete as well as she had hoped. But that same year, she beat all international scullers, including some Olympic medalists, at the Head of the Charles, an annual race in Boston.

“So, I feel like I ended on a high note,” Marden said. 

As these women passed through Princeton’s rowing program, they watched as resources for men and women gradually reached parity. In the 1990s, the women’s locker room was still smaller than the men’s, who had two locker rooms (one for light-weight and the other for heavy-weight). Because Princeton was once an all-male institution, the boathouse itself was built for men. Now, Princeton offers the same resources for all teams.

“Something that you carry with you for life”: A new generation takes the Olympic stage in Paris

As the 2024 Paris Olympics approach, five women from Princeton are once again training to take up Olympic oars, with three representing the United States, one representing Great Britain, and one representing Uganda. 

The sole Ugandan rower is Kathleen Noble ’18, who, like Brown, joined the women’s rowing team her first year with no prior experience.

“I didn’t know anything about rowing before I came to Princeton,” Noble said. But her first-year roommate had been a recruit to the women’s lightweight rowing team, so her sophomore year, Noble walked onto the lightweight team.

Kisubi Beach, Uganda, during a multi-day rowing camp that Kathleen Noble organized in 2022.

Courtesy of kathleen noble.

The team practiced six times a week and trained even in winter.

“I really enjoyed having that time every day that was kind of set aside, that I didn’t have to think about homework or anything, and I could just be in my body, and exercise, and be outside,” Noble said.

In a “strange twist of fate,” as Noble described it, the Uganda national rowing coach happened to be in Princeton the year Noble started rowing. Noble was born and raised in Uganda to Irish parents, and obtained her Ugandan citizenship in 2022. 

Uganda’s rowing community is very small, so the coach was eager to bring Noble into the fold and send her to the World Championships.

“At the time, I was like, I have been rowing for six months. I can’t even balance [the boat],” Noble said.

But the Olympic seed was now planted in Noble’s mind, just as it had been with Brown and Lyman over 40 years prior. 

Noble took a semester off of school to row in Uganda, where she had an open invitation to train with the national team. There, she learned how to scull in these “giant old training boats we have there,” and ended up going to the World Championships for Uganda. After graduating from Princeton with a degree in biology, Noble thought her rowing days were behind her, and moved to Utah to work as a wilderness therapy field instructor.

But the Ugandan national coach thought differently — he told her that the Olympic qualifiers were coming up and asked if she wanted to go. Noble started training again in Salt Lake City and qualified for the 2020 Olympics, which were held in 2021 due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

This made Noble the first person to represent Uganda for rowing in the Olympics.

“The thing that was most surprising for me was how much attention I got back home [in Uganda],” Noble said.

In Tokyo, Noble came in 26th. She said she is looking forward to the Paris Olympics as a more social, lively experience than the pandemic games of Tokyo.

“I’m really excited for Paris, for the energy of it, and having spectators, and just being able to get to know people,” Noble said.

She knows she’s gotten faster since she last competed and hopes to break her Tokyo records.

“I am looking to make a new national record and try to set a standard for future Ugandan rowers,” Noble said. 

Noble reflected on the sense of pride and legacy that comes with being on women’s rowing at Princeton. She has been inspired by the women who came before her, “who were pioneers and went on to do so well.”

“Being part of Princeton rowing is something that you carry with you for life, something that does connect people across generations.”

“Athletics will always be a part of my life”: The old crowd is still going strong  

Noble’s assessment that Princeton women’s rowers never really leave the sport, or the University, behind is fairly accurate. Marden, for example, is back in masters rowing and just won the Henley Royal Regatta this past year in her age group. Lyman only coxed sporadically after her Olympic performance, but she did compete once more in the Head of the Charles in 1977, coxing a women’s four for Brown. They won. 

As for the next generation, Noble is not planning to continue rowing and looks forward to starting a career and a family. She is eager to pass the baton to new Ugandan rowers, who she hopes will reach Olympic waters in the years to come.

Lyman and her husband, a men’s rower who she met at Princeton, continue to visit the boathouse together.

Brown still races the Head of the Charles every year, and sometimes visits Princeton’s boathouse and meets with the current women’s team. Now, when the women’s rowing team enters the boathouse, they are greeted by a black and white photograph of Brown and Youngholm rowing in a pair, captured in 1974. Brown wears her hair in two braids, with a look of determination on her face. 

When Brown visits campus today, every woman in the boat house recognizes her as Carol Brown. She reflected that 40 years later, she maintains relationships with her fellow rowers from Princeton.

“It’s not something that you graduate [from] and everybody just goes their own way,” she said.

“It’s just a different kind of sport.”

Raphaela Gold is an associate Features editor and head Archives editor at the ‘Prince.’

Please send corrections to corrections[at]dailyprincetonian.com.

Princeton in Paris: Tigers at the 2024 Olympics

This year, a record-high number of Princeton students, past and present, will be competing on the world's biggest stage in Paris. The Daily Princetonian looked at the stories of these Olympians, when to watch them compete, and Princeton's long history at the Olympic Games. 

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Rowing at the Paris 2024 Olympic Games

Rowing events for men were first held at the 1900 Olympic Games in Paris, while women’s events were first included in the 1976 Olympics in Montreal.

Here's all you need to know about rowing at Paris 2024.

Olympic rowing schedule, venue and distance

A maximum of 502 rowers will compete in 14 events from Saturday, 27 July to Saturday, 3 August.

There are seven events for men and seven for women - with the medals decided over the last four days.

Great Britain have qualified crews in 10 events and have a team of 42 in France.

Races will take place in six lanes over a straight 2,000m course at the Vaires-sur-Marne Nautical Stadium.

Located on the outskirts of eastern Paris, the venue was completed in 2019 and can accommodate up to 24,000 spectators.

How does Olympic rowing work?

There are two types of rowing - sweep, where each competitor uses a single oar, and sculling, where rowers have two oars.

Boat crews range from single-seater to teams of eight and there are two lightweight events, where the weight of contestants is restricted.

The eight-person crews have a cox, who steers the boat and directs the crew. All the other events are coxless, with rowers responsible for steering their own boat.

How do repechages work in Olympic rowing?

Some rowers will advance directly to the semi-finals or finals from their heats, while some will get a second chance to qualify via the repechage round.

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What are Great Britain's medal chances?

Great Britain topped the medal table at Beijing 2008, London 2012 and Rio 2016 but failed to win a gold at Tokyo 2020 and finished 14th overall.

Britain have rebuilt their team since Tokyo and have the current world champions in the men's four, men's eight, women's lightweight double sculls and women's quadruple sculls.

Lightweight double scullers Imogen Grant and Emily Craig missed out on a medal following a photo finish in Tokyo but have not lost since.

The men’s four of Oliver Wilkes, David Ambler, Matt Aldridge and Freddie Davidson are also unbeaten.

Meanwhile, double Olympic champion and mum-of-three Helen Glover, 38, is hoping to win her third gold as part of the women's four.

Glover and Heather Stanning won back-to-back golds in 2012 and 2016, becoming the first British women to win an Olympic rowing title when they triumphed in the women's pair in London.

The men's pair of Tom George and Ollie Wynne-Griffith are another unbeaten crew this year and have a good chance of winning gold.

The GB team also features brother and sister Tom and Emily Ford, who are competing in the eights, and another mum in Mathilda Hodgkins Byrne.

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Who has won the most Olympic rowing medals for Team GB?

Sir Steve Redgrave is Britain’s most-decorated Olympic rower with five gold medals and a bronze from five successive Games.

Sir Matthew Pinsent, who will be part of BBC Sport's commentary team in France, won four golds, three of them alongside Redgrave.

Dame Katherine Grainger is Britain's most-decorated female rower with a gold and four silvers from five successive Games.

Great Britain are third behind the United States and East Germany in the all-time Olympic rowing medal table, with a total of 31 golds.

When do the Olympics start?

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Evan Olson (far left) rows for the University of Washington. Olson, 27, who is rowing for the U.S. men’s eight at the Paris 2024 Summer Olympic Games, first rowed for the Everett Rowing Association as a junior at Bothell High School. (Photo courtesy Chase Barrows)

Former Everett Rowing Association member Evan Olson representing Team USA in Paris

The first heat of the men’s eight is July 29 at 2:40 a.m. PDT.

• Friday, July 26, 2024 9:59am
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In honor of the start of the Olympics, consider rowing on the river in Dayton

Racing through the water — oars in perfect harmony — working together for a common goal. Tenacity and teamwork go together in rowing.

“And being outside and being on the water,” there’s nothing like it,” said Kate Miller, Dayton Boat Club recruiting director.

With the Olympic Games getting underway, rowing will soon be in the spotlight as the eight-day regatta begins Saturday with 14 events — men’s and women’s single sculls, double sculls, lightweight double sculls, pair, quadruple sculls, four and eight. Chaminade Julienne graduate Molly Bruggeman — who began her training at the Dayton Boat Club — is on Team USA’s roster for the women’s eight event.

Unlike many other Olympic events, rowing is a sport that you can start at any time as the Dayton Boat Club offers learn-to-row opportunities throughout the year with the next adult courses slated for Aug. 16-18 and Aug. 23-25.

Rowing for fitness

“Most people assume rowing is all upper body, but it’s really a full body sport,” Miller said. “There’s a huge impact on the lower body and the core.”

According to the Cleveland Clinic, the benefits of rowing also include improving range of motion and joint strength, reducing stress, improving posture, balance and coordination and calorie burning. The high-cardio activity is also low-impact, making it accessible to a wide variety of current and former athletes.

“We see athletes of all ages who are getting over injuries or rehabbing,” Miller said. “And there are also a lot of athletes, especially runners, who need to find a low-impact activity because of their knees or some other injury.”

Rowing for fun

Competition and camaraderie blend seamlessly in rowing.

“As an adult, it really is the community that I most enjoy about the sport,” Miller said. “The people that find rowing are very interested in being a part of a community of rowers.”

Miller has also seen the positive impact the sport has had on the young DBC rowers. From creating friendships to increasing confidence, the juniors – representing more than 30 schools from across the Miami Valley – bond over a shared love of the sport. And with middle school (5th-8th), novice (8th-12th), and varsity (9th-12th) teams for boys and girls, there are options for rookies and experienced rowers alike in the region’s most successful high school and college feeder rowing program.

Ready to give rowing a try? For more information on the juniors or adult masters’ programs, visit www.daytonboatclub.org .

Rowing 101 primer

Bow: The forward section of the boat. The first part of the boat to cross the finish line. Also, the person in the seat closest to the bow, who crosses the finish line first.

Coxswain: The person who steers the shell and is the on the water coach for the crew.

Ergometer: Rowers call it an “erg.” It’s a rowing machine that closely approximates the actual rowing motion.

Oar: Used to drive the boat forward; rowers do not use paddles.

Port: The left side of the boat, while facing forward, in the direction of the movement.

Repechage: The second-chance race, which ensures that everyone has two chances to advance from preliminary races since there is no seeding in the heats.

Shell: Can be used interchangeably with boat.

Starboard: The right side of the boat, while facing forward, in the direction of movement.

Stern: The rear of the boat; the direction the rowers are facing.

Stroke: The rower who sits closest to the stern. The stroke sets the rhythm for the boat, others behind him must follow his cadence.

Source: US Rowing

About the Author

4 women from UW-Madison’s rowing team will compete for gold at Paris Olympics

Lauren O'Connor, Maddie Wanamaker, Sophia Vitas and Grace Joyce carry on a long tradition for UW-Madison

The old joke about rowing, Lauren O’Connor said, is that it’s the only sport to have roots as a form of corporal punishment. 

“You could go to prison, or you could row on the boats that were taking people across the ocean and doing this really, really hard labor,” she said.

O’Connor, who is from the village of Belleville — population 2,591 — is one of four women from the University of Wisconsin-Madison who will be competing in rowing at the 2024 Summer Olympics in Paris.

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It’s the third time that has happened: Four Wisconsin women competed in both 1992 and 1998, in Barcelona, Spain and Seoul, South Korea, respectively. 

This year’s rowers — O’Connor, Sophia Vitas from Franklin, Maddie Wanamaker from Neenah, and Grace Joyce from Northfield, Illinois — carry on a long tradition for the Badgers. There has been at least one UW-Madison women’s or men’s rower in every Olympics since 1968.

There are two types of rowing — sculling and sweeping . In sweep rowing, each person in the boat holds one oar with both hands. In sculling, each rower holds two oars, one in each hand. 

O’Connor and Joyce will be competing in the quadruple sculls, where four women have two oars each. They both rowed for the Badgers from 2016 until 2020. They qualified for the Olympics by winning the women’s quadruple sculls at the 2024 World Rowing Final Olympic & Paralympic Qualification Regatta in Switzerland in May.

Vitas, a five-time member of the U.S. Senior National Team, will be in the double sculls. This past September, she captured a bronze medal in that boat class at the 2023 World Rowing Championships, helping the U.S. secure an Olympic spot. 

Wanamaker will compete in her second-straight Olympic games after she finished seventh in the women’s four at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics. She is a decorated international rower, most recently finishing fourth in the women’s four at the 2023 World Rowing Championships and winning gold in the four at the 2023 World Rowing Cup II. She will compete in the women’s eight, where each woman has one oar. 

Obviously, they all have the goal of bringing home a medal. But they also said they look forward to the camaraderie that comes with such intense training and competition. 

Though Wisconsin has a long history in Olympic rowing, the team also has a strong walk-on tradition. Wanamaker, Vitas and O’Connor were all walk-ons. 

Wanamaker walked on in her freshman year after taking a summer rowing camp before her senior year of high school. 

“I didn’t start rowing and think, ‘Oh, I’m going to the Olympics,’” she said.

She hoped to make some friends and be physically active in her first year of college. 

“It sounds cliche, but I fell in love with it and I loved being on the water and working together with other people,” Wanamaker said. 

Overuse injuries take time away from competing 

Vitas was anticipating making the team in Tokyo, but a fractured rib a couple of weeks before the team was selected deferred those plans. 

“I’ve fractured my rib about, I think, four times now, maybe five. It’s very common. It’s an overuse injury,” she said. “I think the last cycle, I was prone to a lot more injuries. So that did hold me back quite a bit.”

“People frequently will break their ribs,” O’Connor said. “This is the sport that it’s most common in.”

Rib stress fractures occur in 6 percent to 12 percent of rowers and account for the most time lost from on-water training and competition, according to a paper published in the journal “Sports Medicine .” Repeated physical activity can cause micro-damage to bones. And while bones can heal themselves though the process of bone remodeling , when rowers continue the same repetitive movements it can result in stress fractures. 

Vitas said a different approach to training has allowed her to stay healthier.

“I’ve been able to train more consistently and just kind of stick to the plan rather than have to take a month or two off (for injuries) and then try and catch up again,” she said. 

While Wanamaker had hoped to place higher than seventh in Tokyo, she suffered bigger setbacks in January 2023. 

“I had to have surgery to have my first rib removed because I had thoracic outlet syndrome,” Wanamaker said. “I collapsed, basically, the tunnel that all of my nerves and blood vessels go through because of too much rowing, and I had a big blood clot and woke up one morning with a purple and blue arm.” 

The surgery happened while Wanamaker was training in Colorado Springs for the benefits of performing at a high altitude. She was stabilized in Colorado and then had surgery in Allentown, Pennsylvania, while the rest of her team was training in Florida. 

It was Wanamaker’s second surgery from a rowing injury. The first came when an MRI showed a soft mass of tissue was causing her unbearable shoulder pain. Though her family feared the mass was cancerous, it turned out to be another vascular issue.

And while most assume that rowers have strong arms, O’Connor said that isn’t the case. 

“The strongest muscles that we use are our legs and our core,” she said. “My upper body is not that strong. It’s all in my lower body.” 

‘It’s really hard to afford this lifestyle’ 

Even without injuries, devoting one’s life to rowing comes at a steep cost of stability in finances and housing. Vitas has been in training since she graduated college in 2016. 

“It’s really hard to afford this lifestyle,” she said. “We don’t get a whole lot of money and up until the past few years, we weren’t really allowed to work.”

Athletes train for years at the training center in Princeton, New Jersey, or in Sarasota, Florida. Many live with host families who have helped rowers for decades while the athletes are hundreds of miles away from home with very limited income. 

In the five years after joining the U.S. Rowing team in 2016, Vitas had 10 different living situations with host families. She said it was very stressful to worry about whether another host family would sell their home, or if she would have enough money to buy food each week. 

At the time, Olympic athletes were discouraged from working outside of rowing. Vitas had to survive on meager stipends from the U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Committee. Worse still, Vitas said her stipend was withheld more than once due to “underperforming at practices.” 

“I came very close to quitting around 2018 because I simply couldn’t afford the lifestyle,” she said. “It was really difficult to come back and kind of resurge and use that as fuel.”

Her mother, Janet Wanamaker, said housing was particularly stressful for her daughter during the pandemic years, when host families were more reluctant to take someone into their homes. 

The stipends are a little higher now, and Vitas said she also has a part-time fellowship with a venture capital firm in Houston. UW-Madison recently announced that Vitas will be a graduate assistant coach for rowing. She said it is important to be able to come out of an Olympic career with more on her resume.

“This is still very much an amateur sport in the U.S.,” Vitas said. “In other countries, that is all they do. They row, that’s their job. They get paid hundreds of thousands of dollars … If we had relied only on stipends and if we do not work part-time or full-time jobs, we are living below poverty.” 

Vitas and O’Connor said they would like to see rowing figure out how to get more sponsorships or find ways to make races more fan-friendly to watch. 

“You gotta pull out the binoculars or watch it on the TV,” Vitas said. “It is difficult to kind of grab and hold the attention of fans.” 

No looking past Paris

Winning is the goal in Paris and most of Wisconsin’s rowers were circumspect about what might come next. 

“Goal is a gold medal,” Wanamaker said. 

“I think any Olympian would tell you that. But I think that if we can execute the crew and feel good about the race, have fun with my friends, and kind of live up to the potential that we have as a boat, it will be a successful Olympics,” she said. “And hopefully that will result in the gold medal.” 

After years of seeing her daughter mostly on holidays, when Maddie would often take to the rowing machine in the basement while others were socializing, Janet Wanamaker is looking forward to life after the Olympics. 

“They have their sights set on gold and it’s gonna be tough. It’s competitive,” she said. “But I think it’s just gonna be a really big relief when the pressure of that race is over and we hope to get to spend a little time with her in Paris and have some fun.”

WPR is talking with Wisconsin’s athletes competing in the 2024 Summer Olympic Games in Paris. Head to WPR’s special  Olympic and Paralympic page  to meet more of the competitors.

Wisconsin Public Radio, © Copyright 2024, Board of Regents of the University of Wisconsin System and Wisconsin Educational Communications Board.

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