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Podcast: RowingChat
Episode:

Coaching why athletes revert
Category: Sports & Recreation
Duration: 00:13:29
Publish Date: 2025-06-26 23:19:39
Description: Discover how to overcome your natural biology to resist movement pattern changes in rowing technique. Timestamps 01:00 A coach was frustrated his athletes forget from one workout to the next. The cause is not necessary wilful, it's not your coaching skill - it's biology. We are hard wired to keep to the muscle memory we already have. Rowing Muscle Memory and neural pathways The solution is multiple repetitions of a drill during an outing is important. Your brain prioritises familiar patterns when under stress. Automaticity means we revert back under pressure. - Insufficient repetitions is the solution. The challenge here is inconsistent reinforcement - if you can self-coach this can help. Understand what the coach is teaching - ask questions. Provide drills to the athlete to isolate or exaggerate the movement you are teaching. Increase stroke rate or the power through the water to test your skill under pressure. Cognitive overload leads to frustration The solution here is to practice both thinking and doing. Row for 10 strokes without thinking about anything. During those strokes the athlete is maintaining the new movement pattern. Check after 10 strokes if you are doing it right - if not, adjust and do 10 stroke more not thinking. 05:00 The competence model of unconscious competence is your goal. Train yourself by managing your cognitive overload. The challenge is you can think you are regressing because it feels different and awkward. Learn to overcome this to achieve the end goal. 06:00 Athlete receptiveness You must test your skill under pressure with increasing challenge so that when you're at your most pressurised in a race you are also tired and stressed yet you maintain the technique. Fear of failure as the new technique is untested. Overcoming this is hard - athletes try hard to perform well. Poor communication undermines an athlete's ability to take up what you're trying to teach. Explain what you're trying to do and why as well as how to do it. Peer Pressure - the difference between style and technique. If a leader in the group disagrees they can refuse to change and if you're following someone who is rowing differently it's hard. This requires a different intervention. Ask me if you need this. 09:30 How to coach change and prevent reversion Approach the change in micro steps. Take a small first step - do the drill in a stable boat with others sitting it level, isolate part of the stroke, row one person at a time. External cues - can you use video, physical markers, feel, or hearing to assess when you are getting it right? Train under duress - make it harder for yourself progressively by adding duress to test your skill. Accountability - crew feedback by asking others if you are doing it right. Agree together to be accountable. Gain buy-in as a coach so the athletes trust that your teaching will be beneficial. Explaining the why. Normalise the struggle - we are on a journey seeking the perfect stroke. We are in this together.
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