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Rowing vice swimming?

mttaggart

Member
Hey everyone,

So, I have this pretty sweet deal where the college I just graduated from will let me use their gym this summer free of charge (opposed to 114 smackers for the local Y--no thanks). Thing is, the pool is basically never open. I understand why, I mean, it's not like the place is brimming with student lifeguards. So I don't have a pool where I can do a lot of the swimming parts of OCS prep workouts.

It occurs to me that rowing might be an acceptable substitute, since it is also a full-body workout, and when done for long enough, comparably aerobic. Is this reasonable? And if so, what sort of distance subsitutions might I use. For example, 500m sidestroke = what, like 1500 rowing? I have no idea.

Thanks.
 

mttaggart

Member
Haha, oh man. The closest lake is a loooong drive away from this Philly suburb. And the only reasonable river, the Schuylkill, is, well, the Schuylkill. You're likely to become a hypodermic needle pincushion or an acid-dissolved skeleton after a dip in there.:eek:
 

Pags

N/A
pilot
If you're looking to swim to just get into shape, then rowing would be a decent substitute for a low impact, full body workout.

If you're swimming to get into swimming shape, improve your strokes, water confidence, etc, then you need to swim. Either pony up the $ for the Y or schedule your workouts around the available times.
 

DanMa1156

Is it baseball season yet?
pilot
Contributor
I'm a rower and a swimmer. There's a lot of similar coordination going on -- and that's why a lot of swimmers become rowers. With that said, you need to make sure if you're on the erg, you have to know how to erg/row CORRECTLY; additionally, your strength will improve, but not your strokes. Biggest thing with strokes is to practice technique and get it down pat.
 

othromas

AEDO livin’ the dream
pilot
Crossfit.com has been periodically adding videos on good rowing form on their website--might give that a shot.

I messed my ankle up my freshman year of college and had to start swimming with no high school background whatsoever. I got a book called Fitness Swimming, and later, one called Total Immersion. Both state that the way most people learn to swim is mediocre at best, terrible at worst, and provide tons and tons of drills to teach you how to swim more like an elite swimmer. While both books focus exclusively on the front crawl/freestyle, just learning a few of the techniques will carry over into lots of other strokes, even the survival ones.
 

usmarinemike

Solidly part of the 42%.
pilot
Contributor
I'm a rower and a swimmer. There's a lot of similar coordination going on -- and that's why a lot of swimmers become rowers. With that said, you need to make sure if you're on the erg, you have to know how to erg/row CORRECTLY; additionally, your strength will improve, but not your strokes. Biggest thing with strokes is to practice technique and get it down pat.

BINGO! Rowing rocks your body if you do it right. It wrecks your body and wastes time if you do it wrong (ie monkey fucking a football).

Obviously rowing won't help your swimming technique or your confidence in the water which total about 80% of what survival swimming is all about. Take that comment for what its worth. It's my 2 cents.
 

DanMa1156

Is it baseball season yet?
pilot
Contributor
I know a TON of hot girls that row for the UT Rowing Team.

With that being said I'm more of a swimmer.

Which totally answers the OP's question!

This is how threads degenerate here... next up will be "Who's got pics of hot rowing chicks?"

:rolleyes:
 

Beans

*1. Loins... GIRD
pilot
Rowing's a good full-body workout, but it's a bit leg-heavy - especially if you do it right. That said, in college I could knock out a Navy PRT run at 6:00/mile pace after an entire winter of rowing w/o any running. But rowing on a machine is a drag, especially if you don't have a good reason to do it (such as getting in shape to row on the water). Another problem with rowing (on machine or boat) is similar to swimming: you have to spend a bit of time learning how to do it properly before you can get much productive exercise out of it.

The Schuylkill is not good for rowing? It sounds like you live there. Have you ever seen it? It's like the rowing capital of the USA.

@ Rufio: Are they lightweights?
 

chupacabra

Member
pilot
Contributor
Which totally answers the OP's question!

This is how threads degenerate here... next up will be "Who's got pics of hot rowing chicks?"

:rolleyes:

That's because asking a question on an internet forum, no matter how relevant the question may be to the forum's purpose, is equivalent to stepping up to a microphone in front of a large crowd and posing the question there. One or two people might have the exact answer you're looking for, most will not attempt to answer the question, but instead tell you their personal experience with whatever it is you're talking about, and a few hecklers will spout off a quick attempt at humor, with varying degrees of success.

It's an internet discussion forum, don't set your expectations too high.

Hmm...still trying to figure out which group I'm in.
 

DanMa1156

Is it baseball season yet?
pilot
Contributor
^ I wasn't actually angry at all; merely just showing the start of the denegration of this thread to either:

-hot girls
-When are they bringing the Tomcat back?
-What % get jets? (Rhetorical or not)

Etc. you get the point.
 

HeyJoe

Fly Navy! ...or USMC
None
Super Moderator
Contributor
Which totally answers the OP's question!

This is how threads degenerate here... next up will be "Who's got pics of hot rowing chicks?"

:rolleyes:

Below in GoggleFu for you

womens_crew.jpg


So which ones are supposedly hot again?
 

DanMa1156

Is it baseball season yet?
pilot
Contributor
^Terrible form -- legs spread (we're talking about rowing here!!!) up in the Bow 3; splashing the water up in bow seat and she's way early, 2 Seat's eye's are not in the boat, nor are stroke seat's, nor 5's. Stroke seat is way high.

;)
 

mttaggart

Member
The Schuylkill is not good for rowing? It sounds like you live there. Have you ever seen it? It's like the rowing capital of the USA.

Beans, you're absolutely right. Boathouse row is one of the neater things to see in Philly. And for rowing, the Schuylkill is fantastic. Swimming not so much. Maybe that's why it's so good for rowing--there is A LOT of incentive to keep the boat upright.

Thanks for all the answers to the OP...and for the pictures of rowers, I guess? I'm not worried about water confidence at all. I'm just trying to do this Stew Smith jam and, as many of you know, it has quite a bit of swimming. But yeah, I know how to row correctly (read: my brother was on crew and taught me, take that for what it's worth); and I actually enjoy the erg. Now, since I ain't SPECWAR, I won't be doing nearly as much swimming as the Stew Smith workouts call for. So given my lack of access to a pool, rowing instead seems to be a good way to go.

For the record, I've been using a 3:1 rowing/swimming distance ratio. That seems about right, but if anyone thinks it's totally of, let me know.
 
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