Customer Reviews

Rowing Faster

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This book is the best source of information to increase boat speed.
Xeno Muller
www.gorow.com
Olympic Medalist, men's single scull rowing.

Unfortunately, I just returned this book because I didn't find it very useful to me personally. Despite what that says about me as a rower, I feel that the description of the book "great for beginners to the elite" is a bit misleading. While the book addresses some issues with beginners, it's really talking to beginners [who will eventually become elite rowers].

The book reads a lot like a physics or math book. It has a ton of charts, graphs, and things dealing with physical fitness that you wouldn't know unless you saw a specialist to have testing done. It's a very dry read but makes for a good reference book.

Many of the authors talk about "the ideal" rower, being so-many feet tall with 6% bodyfat, along with other ideals. While this is fine, the bulk of the text has an undertone that suggests "if you don't meet these ideals, you're going to suck at rowing." The book often refers to your first "years of training" as if you're wasting your time if you're only doing this for a year or two.

Each chapter is written by a different person, so there's not really a lot of chronology. There's nothing really wrong with this, but it refers back to the book seeming a lot like a textbook.

Rowing is a tough sport, and there's no "you can do it!" or "great job!" encouragement for beginners in this book. Think of it as a text version of a coach. In fact, the book seems to be geared more toward coaches, and less toward individual rowers.

Nothing I've said is explicitly negative, just not what I was looking for in this book. I have to say it's jam packed with information, much of it technical, about this great sport. This would make a great reference book for a coach, team captain, or SERIOUS rower.

If I were to sum it up in one sentence, the book says "This is what rowing is, this is what rowers have to do to be awesome, take it or leave it."

This book is not for novices, it's for the already advanced rower, who wants to significantly improve their speed, and technique. It goes into complete detail on every major subject pretaining to rowing, from race prep. months in advance, to the race itself, this book covers it all.

This is the definitive book on the current state of the art in rowing both on the water and on the erg. But it won't teach you how to row. Only how to think about things to improve and how everything fits together. The only other product out there today that comes close to this, and is really an excellent companion piece, is Xeno Muller's interactive DVDs.

'Rowing Faster' is the best and most up-to-date textbook on rowing I know. Each chapter within segments such as physiology, psychology, technique etc. is written by a true expert and well edited by Volker Nolte.
Buy this book.

This book is fun to read and has a lot of useful tips. I'd recommend it for anyone who's into rowing. I'm basically a beginner (1 year of rowing), so it was useful for me, but there was plenty of advanced stuff, as well as information for coaches and coxswains.

However, I have two criticisms of this book. First, it's essentially a compilation of essays about rowing, so it lacks unity or a coherent order to it. Thus, it's not as navigable as, say, a "Rowing for Dummies" book would be if they made one. Second, many of the chapters are heavily laden with scientific detail about physiology and the bodily functions that are occurring when you're rowing. Reading that stuff was very complicated, and also unnecessary - I'd rather have more practice and training techniques and less of the science behind why they work.

Aside from those criticisms, the book was good. It offers some helpful tips, although I had the feeling that I had to skim through a lot of other stuff in order to get to the tips I wanted. And, of course, no book is going to make you a good rower - that can only come with practice.

I wish someone would write a better rowing book because I think there's a lot of room for improvement. But among the rowing books out there, this is one of the best.

This book is not made for rower athlete, is more dedicated to rower coaches. Is has too much technical information tat athletes are not familiar with.