https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aaMHbTxZYuc

00:01
hey welcome to ready row usa it we have
00:06
illustrious guests today jim dietz
00:09
and mark wilson from all-american rowing
00:11
camp are going to be introducing y'all to 
00:13
the concept of head racing and touching
00:16
on some of the exciting races around the
00:18
country that they've gone to mostly
00:21
we're talking today about the ones in
00:24
october and november
00:26
the ohio secret city head of the charles
00:29
head of the schuylkill,
00:31
hooch and the south and they're
00:34
probably these guys will probably wander
00:36
on to some other topics too so
00:39
i am really looking forward to this
00:41
discussion we'll introduce them in a
00:42
second and you get to see them on if
00:44
you're watching on
00:46
the live stream and please
00:48
put any comments
00:50
in the chat we can ask them in real time
00:52
i'm charlotte pierce i'm the producer
00:54
and
00:56
i
00:56
before we get started i want to thank
00:59
our
01:00
newest sponsor sykes rowing sykes usa
01:03
it's an australian based company
01:06
but they have amazing boats i just
01:08
bought one
01:09
and
01:10
um they're destined for our customer
01:13
service hall of fame i think the the
01:15
experience of buying this boat from
01:18
sykes was
01:19
so
01:20
pleasant. the boat
01:22
is a 135 light flyweight and it
01:26
just flies on the water so i appreciate
01:29
all that fabio selvib did to make that
01:32
happen
01:35
okay we are as i said
01:39
let me get them on screen here
01:41
mark wilson
01:43
is on the bottom there and jim dietz is
01:46
in the middle
01:47
hydrating himself
01:50
how are you guys doing
01:52
very good thank you yeah you're getting
01:54
ready for some head races
01:56
oh i've already raced in one this past
01:59
weekend we had the head of the pond in
02:01
mashpee massachusetts it's a 7 500 meter
02:05
race that goes from one lake to another
02:07
lake around three islands and back
02:10
and it was a lot of fun yeah cool and
02:13
mark you've been getting ready for your
02:15
european
02:16
camps and the head of the charles camp
02:18
right
02:19
yep we've got uh we've got things
02:20
planned all through the fall been doing
02:22
some coaching down here in hot florida
02:24
and uh training in my driveway and
02:27
leaving uh sweat ponds in my driveway
02:30
from my erg session so uh i've seen some
02:32
pictures
02:34
it's been good so yeah for having us on
02:36
the show today yeah you're welcome it's
02:38
always great and i i want to do this
02:40
annually we're actually in episode 95
02:44
so we're counting down to 100
02:47
and we'll be going we've been going
02:49
since 2018 will be um
02:52
we'll be uh going into our fourth year
02:55
so
02:56
uh let me just uh get you guys get
02:59
started on why you like head racing and
03:02
and uh i'll cue up the websites for the
03:04
ones that we'll be talking about
03:07
well i think where we wanted to start
03:08
today charlotte is is
03:11
where head racing really originated and
03:13
uh for the most part it originated in in
03:17
great britain with the bump races
03:19
between the schools and
03:21
you know having
03:22
long windy stretches of of the thames
03:26
river
03:27
and not many straight shots that have
03:30
sprint racing head racing started there
03:34
it it here in the united states it
03:36
didn't start until 1965
03:39
uh when ernie arlette who was the
03:42
legendary
03:44
first coach of uh northeastern
03:47
university
03:48
uh got together with the cambridge bow
03:50
club and said look nothing's happening
03:53
here in the united states in the fall we
03:55
need to have a race in the fall and
03:57
there was the was the impetus to start
04:01
the very first head of the charles so it
04:04
was ernie arlette and darcy mcmahon and
04:06
a few people from the cambridge bow club
04:09
that started that event where
04:12
in the very first year you could
04:13
probably put all of the competitors
04:16
who weren't on the you know from
04:19
the charles river itself in the
04:21
cambridge parking lot and now what was
04:23
the weather like that year
04:25
it was i i don't i think it was rainy
04:29
for some reason i remember rain i i i
04:32
came up
04:33
uh our car broke down on the mass pike
04:36
we hitched the rest of the way in
04:39
uh to boston and stayed at uh
04:43
the harvard law school dorms because one
04:45
of our
04:46
one of our teammates was was at harvard
04:49
law school but
04:51
writing an event today
04:53
i know that the it when one year was
04:55
snowing since i've been in this area and
04:58
one year it was 80 degrees so that's
05:00
october 22nd um coming up we'll have to
05:04
say and one year it was cancelled that
05:06
that what year mark was 1997. yep right
05:10
we retreated to the bar right during the
05:13
deluge of of rain pelting down and
05:16
flooding the charles river
05:19
and last year it was virtual so we're
05:22
back on the river we've seen that race
05:24
has seen it all but there's a lot of
05:26
other races and i think one of the
05:27
things that we want to want to do is
05:29
talk a lot about some or a little bit
05:31
about all of several other races and uh
05:34
i think one of the unique things about
05:35
head racing that i really enjoy is this
05:38
is the
05:39
is the uniqueness of each and every race
05:42
and i think as you are planning for your
05:46
fall fall rowing uh series if you have
05:49
an opportunity to travel to different
05:51
locations or if you as a scholar or as a
05:55
group of a four or a pair or double or
05:58
whatever you happen to be have an
06:00
opportunity look around the calendar and
06:02
see if there's other races that you
06:04
might want to go and explore
06:06
we're going to talk about a handful of
06:08
kind of the bigger races but
06:11
our races everywhere as jim just
06:13
mentioned the new little uh
06:15
race out on mashpee pond and then
06:18
you know there's races all around the
06:20
midwest and and um further around new
06:23
england and in the mid-atlantic and so
06:25
on so i would really encourage people to
06:28
yeah
06:28
when i was prepping this session i i
06:31
just looked on regatta central and
06:33
there's a search box and you can just
06:35
type in head you know and then you go by
06:37
the date
06:38
but there's just a million of them and i
06:41
didn't really know what to choose but i
06:43
i picked some of the ones in the east
06:45
here
06:46
yeah yep and there's already been head
06:49
races out in uh california they had a
06:52
half marathon race in petaluma a couple
06:54
weeks ago
06:55
um there's races out in uh sacramento
06:58
california and obviously up in seattle
07:01
the famous head of the lake and
07:02
frostbite regatta so they're all over
07:04
the place and i just would encourage
07:06
people to you know
07:07
war and look around as you as you go
07:12
they're great social events that you
07:15
know you get out and you meet a lot of
07:17
nice people and as mark says you see a
07:20
lot of different waterways and
07:22
you know all of them have their
07:23
challenges
07:25
that's for sure and the first one the
07:27
first race that we're highlighting here
07:28
today is the head of the ohio
07:31
and that certainly is has a challenging
07:33
waterway i've i've raced in the head of
07:35
the ohio i've taken teams to the head of
07:37
the ohio in the past and uh sometimes
07:40
it's like uh mashb pond probably or or a
07:44
real quiet
07:45
corner of the charles river but on other
07:47
years it can be like an ocean out there
07:49
and
07:50
the head of the ohio it can be
07:52
challenging for you if you're not used
07:54
to big water
07:56
and it's not in the midwest it's in
07:58
pittsburgh right
07:59
yeah yeah head of the ohio's in
08:01
pittsburgh right that's where the ohio
08:02
river starts so it's actually a very
08:05
apropos name um the ohio river is the
08:08
formation of the monahan gagila and the
08:10
allegheny rivers and so you actually are
08:13
at the head of the ohio
08:15
which is actually kind of unique and fun
08:17
to fun to think about so but it's a
08:19
beautiful beautiful city there's been a
08:21
lot of changes over the last few years
08:23
at the venue when uh with the formation
08:26
and the development of the waterfront
08:28
there with the new stadiums and so on so
08:31
it used to be a lot different than it is
08:33
now and i think that's one of the other
08:34
unique things with a lot of our races is
08:36
that the riverfronts around america are
08:38
finally becoming uh more valued and the
08:42
highlighting of some of these events
08:44
that have been going on for a long long
08:46
time are being seen by more people just
08:48
because of the venue as being more
08:50
developed and and more sought after so
08:54
it was certainly one of those i love
08:56
pittsburgh it's i was there for a
08:58
conference a few years ago and just
09:00
it's really fun and i really wanted to
09:02
row but i didn't get a chance
09:05
but um
09:06
so the head of the ohio is one of the
09:08
big one of the bigger first races it's
09:10
the first weekend of october um and
09:13
thousands of people will end up
09:14
converging in on on
09:16
pittsburgh and it's a nice location be
09:19
for people to come in from the midwest a
09:22
lot of folks will come in from western
09:24
ohio or even indiana and then
09:27
and then obviously people from the
09:29
mid-atlantic states it's an easy drive
09:31
up from philadelphia and washington dc
09:34
so you get a nice
09:35
cross-representation of of uh
09:37
participants from from the two kind of
09:40
bigger regions the northeast
09:42
mid-atlantic and then obviously also the
09:43
midwest so it's a neat neat need for
09:46
that as well now do all these head races
09:48
have different like cutoff dates for
09:51
registration i mean could you still get
09:53
into the head of the ohio or not
09:55
uh
09:56
i don't know that's a good question
09:58
that's the beauty that's the beauty of
10:00
uh regatta central and the opportunity
10:02
to go to uh exactly
10:04
yeah and then be able to see
10:06
uh what you can what you can still enter
10:08
and so on uh usually i think it's a
10:11
couple of weeks out first for the races
10:15
but obviously a lot of these bigger
10:16
races do fill um early and so
10:20
it may be too late but i'm not i'm not
10:22
sure i know the head of the hooch which
10:23
we'll be talking about later just opened
10:25
like yesterday or something well okay
10:28
that's another good point though
10:29
charlotte uh because some of the races
10:33
are are being limited to the number of
10:36
people that can actually attend them and
10:38
uh this weekend i know is the uh
10:42
the the the opening of the head of the
10:46
housatonic in connecticut
10:48
and if you're not online within the
10:51
first couple of hours you might not get
10:53
in the race because they're so over
10:55
subscribed yeah so that is a very good
10:58
point and you know just going regatta
11:00
central if you queue up the regattas you
11:03
want to go to on regatta central yeah
11:05
they'll send you an email saying
11:07
registration
11:08
you can actually put them on a favorites
11:10
list or something yeah yeah kind of like
11:12
getting on southwest airlines you know
11:14
you got to make the call
11:16
well i got into the head of the charles
11:18
again for the second time on the lottery
11:20
because i didn't qualify this time you
11:23
know last time i was in but um so i'm
11:25
i'm like
11:27
i'm getting nervous
11:28
yeah
11:29
i don't know you'll do fine yeah
11:32
i'll live it's only half an hour out of
11:34
your life right
11:35
mark we had the worcester group at the
11:37
head of the pond this year they came
11:39
with nice two threes
11:42
two triples huh
11:43
two triples yeah and and others those
11:46
mike spelaine raced you know they did
11:48
well that's great
11:50
you mean
11:53
the secret city head race and the secret
11:55
city is in my old town that i used to
11:58
live in and and uh can talk a little bit
12:00
about the secret city head race it's a
12:01
beautiful venue in oak ridge tennessee
12:04
and uh usually the second weekend of
12:07
october and it is again uh masters
12:11
collegiate and high school racing and i
12:14
think that's one of the other unique
12:15
things about head races jim was talking
12:17
about that in our pre-show in our green
12:19
room and how unique that is to the sport
12:21
jim you want to talk about that just a
12:23
little bit
12:24
what was that mark the idea how unique
12:27
racing is head races is because you have
12:28
the juniors the masters and the
12:30
collegiate teams that's right you know
12:32
and uh other people have mentioned that
12:35
to me in the past that have come from
12:37
other sports that
12:39
it's it's very unusual to have
12:42
olympians racing in the same races as
12:46
juniors and masters and whatever this
12:49
past weekend the youngest scholar we had
12:51
in in our regatta was 13 in our first
12:54
year of sculling she was able to compete
12:57
against jebby stone who just completed
12:59
her third olympics all right other
13:02
people in the race
13:03
going up to 85 years of age so
13:07
knowing your handicap or your split
13:11
going into these head races you're
13:13
mixing gender and everything else
13:16
you know trying to set up races which
13:18
makes it
13:18
very competitive for everybody so you
13:21
know you can run the gamut
13:23
and for kids to be able to be in races
13:25
where
13:27
they're seeing olympians and being able
13:29
to talk to olympians and you know talk
13:32
to masters that have been in
13:35
in different
13:36
international races and stuff like that
13:38
you know it's kind of special in
13:41
you you don't get that in in other
13:43
sports
13:44
i think the melting pot at the dock and
13:46
then the regatta side is absolutely
13:48
fantastic and that's one of the cool
13:50
things about all these head races uh the
13:52
secret city head race is a fairly
13:54
straightforward uh 5k race you go you
13:57
start more or less at the finish line at
13:59
the venue in oak ridge which were held
14:02
masters national this year and have held
14:04
uh regionals and uh ncaa so it's a very
14:08
well known 2000 meter race course maybe
14:10
a little less known for its 5k but the
14:12
5k if you're looking at the screen it
14:14
starts uh 3k above the starting line for
14:19
the sprint race course and you go up
14:22
there towards clinton you're following
14:23
you're rowing upstream and then the
14:25
racecourse is downstream the one bridge
14:28
it's a fairly straightforward easy easy
14:31
uh race course so there's no real
14:34
challenge in the in the course itself
14:36
just some nice gradual turns you come
14:38
under the railroad bridge and then the
14:40
last 2000 meters is straight as an arrow
14:42
right down the uh 2000 meter sprint
14:44
course and you finish at the finish line
14:46
so it's a pretty neat um pretty neat
14:49
pretty neat race and it looks gorgeous
14:51
and it is gorgeous it's falling in
14:54
middle tennis or in east tennessee and
14:56
then oftentimes the some of the best
14:58
time to be in in tennessee absolutely it
15:00
looks like
15:01
um
15:02
so after that after secret city which is
15:05
the 17th of october starts
15:08
we have
15:09
ta-da
15:11
the head of the charleston the charles
15:14
you know one of the things i think that
15:16
makes the head of the charles special is
15:18
the seven bridges
15:20
right and and the severity of the turns
15:23
you mean the ones that grab your boat
15:25
when you're going through
15:26
and and that's where you have to be a
15:27
little bit more cerebral in in thinking
15:30
about your race you know uh there are
15:33
there are sections of the race where you
15:35
want to be going fast and there are
15:37
sections of the race that you actually
15:38
want to be slowing down because making
15:41
those turns can save you minutes
15:44
all right and um
15:45
you know you often see that with the
15:47
person that's coming to the charles for
15:49
the first time
15:50
you know that they go through a bridge
15:52
and they're going
15:54
60 degrees out of the direction of the
15:57
race course yeah
15:58
which which just
16:00
you know just slows you down
16:02
tremendously so you really have to this
16:04
the study the race course that you're
16:06
going to be going into uh you wanna you
16:09
wanna
16:10
get some information of about the person
16:13
starting in front of you and the person
16:15
starting behind you
16:16
knowing whether they're locals or
16:18
whether they're
16:20
here visiting and their course might be
16:22
terrible you know how to track
16:25
through the race course or former
16:26
national team members from uh
16:29
australia or somewhere yeah yeah
16:32
it is fun and then you i mean like
16:34
i raced in 2018 and then i got you know
16:37
to chat with the people who had
16:40
passed me or i had passed them or you
16:42
know it was all really fun
16:45
i mean i was terrified before i started
16:47
but it it was it was a great experience
16:50
yeah
16:50
um
16:52
and i think what you think about how
16:54
these races have changed though
16:56
charlotte all right at the very first
16:58
head of the charles
16:59
as you went past
17:01
the boston university boathouse
17:04
there was a section of three-quarter
17:06
inch ply
17:08
that had a seth thomas clock on it
17:11
and they took a polaroid picture of you
17:15
getting the second hand in and
17:17
supposedly that was
17:19
hooked up exactly to the clock at the
17:22
finish line where they took a second
17:24
picture of you as you went by
17:26
and then they went back to the cambridge
17:28
bow club and and did the math yeah why
17:31
in those first years you had to have
17:33
several kegs of beer because you had to
17:35
keep the people entertained while
17:37
they're trying to figure out who really
17:39
won
17:41
well
17:42
our electronics has gotten a lot better
17:44
over the years and and those
17:47
results are
17:48
instantaneous now
17:50
and extremely accurate so yeah cool but
17:54
you think about where we came from
17:57
um yeah i interviewed the guy who runs
18:00
he's run the start line
18:02
tech stuff for
18:03
uh 35 years
18:05
yeah yeah
18:08
i don't want to take too much away from
18:09
the head of the charles but also this
18:11
weekend is the head of the cuyahoga i
18:13
was just looking on regatta central
18:15
head of the cuyahoga i know that's not
18:16
in our list right now and we don't have
18:18
to have a screen on it but the head of
18:19
the cuyahoga is in uh cleveland and it
18:22
touts itself as
18:24
equally challenging because there are
18:26
the same number of turns and the same
18:28
number of bridges at the head of the
18:30
cuyahoga so if somebody wants to train
18:32
for the head of the charles they really
18:34
ought to make their way to cleveland and
18:36
run that a month ahead of time and then
18:38
be prepped and yeah
18:40
for the for the charles i raced that
18:42
race back uh a number of years ago as
18:44
well and it was super challenging and
18:47
those sea walls are really uh really
18:50
hard
18:51
and how far away is that or what how
18:53
where is it that's in cleveland
18:55
cleveland yeah yeah in the real ohio
18:58
yeah up there um and i want to you know
19:01
take just a second to plug your your
19:04
head of the charles rowing camps while
19:05
we're on that uh race um
19:09
you know i think we
19:10
might have to do we might have to do
19:12
three next year we did
19:15
we've done one head of the charles
19:17
racing camp with jim
19:19
and i kind of as your as your coaches
19:21
and so on for the last i don't know
19:23
eight years nine years something like
19:24
that and uh this year we had such an
19:27
interest in the first one that we added
19:29
a second one and filled them filled them
19:30
both so
19:31
it's a lot of fun and like jim always
19:33
says it's an opportunity for people to
19:35
get the you know to kind of have the
19:38
tour without the
19:39
the
19:40
you know the big circus going on exactly
19:43
yeah i mean there's so many strategies
19:45
that you can pick up from that camp and
19:47
you know i don't know if anyone else
19:48
does them but yours is just so much fun
19:51
and so productive you know i i knew a
19:54
lot of people who wanted to come and you
19:56
were already full so
20:00
we put it up earlier
20:01
um so what do we got next uh
20:04
the school head of the school kill and
20:06
this year will be the 50th anniversary
20:09
of the very first head of the school
20:11
kill regatta
20:13
wow that's a milestone so you know it
20:15
started six years after the head of the
20:17
charles i think it actually was the
20:20
second head race in the united states
20:22
you know following the charles
20:25
it just blossomed
20:27
from there you know all the different
20:30
regattas yeah i'd really like a little
20:32
shorter race than the charles uh it's
20:35
downstream i think it's only
20:38
two and a half miles it's really quick
20:40
and this year
20:42
because of the flooding on the river
20:44
it's even going to be shorter uh
20:47
because yeah how's that
20:50
well
20:52
the the the safety line that goes across
20:55
boathouse road to keep people from going
20:57
over the falls
20:59
that was ripped out by the logs and
21:01
everything flooding over it so
21:03
you know for safety this year i i think
21:05
they're going to be start stopping it a
21:07
hundred meters shorter
21:09
so they can turn the people around
21:11
safely to to get them back up and yeah
21:13
so there again you're you're coming to a
21:15
historic rowing city yeah you know with
21:18
with you know so much to do there and so
21:21
much to see there and
21:23
again it's a great event and why have
21:25
these events continued to grow because
21:28
our sport is growing along with it
21:30
you know people need regattas to go to
21:33
and i think um you know if if you can go
21:36
to the school
21:38
they need a lot of support down there
21:41
that some of those boat clubs just lost
21:44
you know
21:45
tons of boats and racks and right things
21:48
like that so you know just
21:50
help them out
21:52
all right for sure
21:53
so have you uh raced that jim
21:56
i embraced that several times um
22:02
just a couple i guess yeah it's the head
22:04
of the charles the one you raced the
22:05
most yeah the charles is definitely the
22:08
one i raced the most i've only missed
22:10
one out of the past 57 years or 56 years
22:14
that's
22:15
amazing
22:19
we can go on if or do anything else on
22:22
the school
22:23
well i'll just mention i'm looking again
22:25
at the race site race regatta central
22:27
and i think it's just interesting to
22:28
mention you know along the same weekend
22:30
as the head of the schuylkill there's
22:32
also the north star regatta in
22:34
minneapolis there's the wormtown chase
22:36
over in worcester mass there's the head
22:38
of the colorado which is a big race down
22:40
in austin texas the blake haxton fall
22:44
regatta in columbus ohio is going on the
22:46
same time and then down here in florida
22:49
the halloween regatta over in tampa
22:51
florida and then the head of the bull
22:53
trout up in lake stevens washington
22:56
and uh the portland fall classic in
22:59
vancouver and then the speakman memorial
23:02
regatta
23:03
in columbus ohio so all of those events
23:06
going on in on the same weekend as one
23:08
of the as you know arguably the second
23:10
largest head race in the in the country
23:12
we can do a little road trip around you
23:13
know well it shows what jim's talking
23:15
about you know it's it just explains how
23:17
big this is and how many opportunities
23:20
there are to go uh try other places so
23:23
you know and often i'll just mention too
23:25
you know we have people and jim is jim
23:27
while he's been coaching at umass for
23:29
the last 24 years after before retiring
23:31
he was always
23:33
arranging or help arrange boats for
23:34
other teams that were coming in from the
23:36
other parts of the country and i think
23:38
that's one of the beauties of our sport
23:40
is that we're we're a very giving sport
23:42
so if you're wanting to travel or find
23:45
yourself in texas for example there's
23:47
any number of boat clubs that would
23:49
certainly find you a boat or rent you a
23:51
boat or own you a boat for a regatta um
23:54
you know and and just a little planning
23:57
a little pre-planning on that and uh you
23:59
you would have a great time i'm sure
24:00
yeah i did it for the hooch you know
24:02
they just they just gave me a boat to
24:04
use and yeah
24:06
it was just so nice yeah you know if if
24:09
you're a
24:10
recreational rower who doesn't really go
24:12
to regattas and you're listening to this
24:15
i would encourage you to pick out one of
24:17
these regattas and go because
24:19
yeah it's a social event you'll get to
24:21
meet other rowers at of of your own
24:24
caliber there's always that people there
24:27
that can help you with with
24:30
the strategy of how to row the race or
24:32
you're rigging you know
24:34
you know just to make that connection to
24:37
the rest of the rowing community i think
24:39
you you you'd really appreciate
24:42
how friendly people are at these
24:43
regattas you know
24:45
weekends regatta
24:47
i'm out pulling the course and three
24:49
hours later people are still on the
24:50
beach drinking
24:52
eating
24:53
donuts you know it's like
24:55
it's just a good time
24:57
i mean i'm i get nervous but i'm always
24:59
i'm always happy i did it you know and
25:01
it it's it's just a little
25:03
you know effort out of your life and
25:05
then you go and enjoy things yeah
25:09
that race goes like that i mean yeah
25:12
you might think it's four thousand seven
25:14
hundred and twenty meters
25:16
if it's the charles or seven thousand
25:18
five hundred at the head of the pond it
25:21
goes really quick and and
25:24
you get to enjoy
25:25
a beautiful fall day right and um the
25:29
hooch
25:31
uh which i've wrote wrote in but the um
25:34
the year i went
25:37
oh god i didn't want to do that um
25:40
they it would the the flow was so fast
25:43
that they cut it in half
25:45
right yeah yeah i don't know that's the
25:48
thing with a lot of the races and and
25:50
you do want to do a little homework and
25:52
kind of look at
25:53
look at the last few years results and
25:56
think about the weather and stuff and
25:58
especially if you're traveling a long
26:00
way with equipment
26:02
definitely look at the weather forecast
26:03
before you go and
26:05
make sure that you you know they're
26:06
gonna they're gonna row it or
26:09
it having plan b is along the way as
26:11
well
26:12
so not only do things happen a lot of
26:14
these regattas have been set in stone as
26:16
far as the first weekend or the third
26:18
weekend whatever weekend of the month
26:20
that they happen to fall on for years
26:22
but things do happen this year um my
26:25
friend who runs the music city head race
26:28
in nashville tennessee
26:30
uh john miller he's the coach at
26:32
vanderbilt they had to move their
26:34
regatta day
26:36
uh a weekend or two i forget which it
26:39
was one or two weekend they had to
26:41
change it because the rolling stones
26:44
were doing a concert at the football
26:46
stadium which is
26:48
so they always are on a non-football
26:51
weekend at the music city but here who
26:54
would have guessed that the rolling
26:55
stones would be coming into town so they
26:57
they weren't gonna uh compete against
26:59
the against the um the rolling stones
27:02
obviously so
27:03
that one year in pittsburgh that jimmy
27:05
buffett was uh oh my gosh yeah that's
27:07
right
27:07
[Laughter]
27:09
so is he as popular as the stones
27:12
yeah well pretty much
27:16
they have all these jimmy buffett heads
27:18
where everybody's wearing their coconuts
27:20
and
27:21
beach hats right yeah
27:24
lots of margaritas
27:25
you do want to you do want to plan your
27:27
your
27:28
calendar and look at the regatta
27:30
schedule uh early as possible as you're
27:33
kind of making your plans so but the
27:35
head of the hooch that's a great regatta
27:37
as well it's a relatively
27:38
straightforward course but as charlotte
27:40
already mentioned water flow rate can
27:42
change drastically and make the race a
27:45
very uh short event downstream but
27:48
obviously if you've got a huge ra a huge
27:50
current coming down you've got to race
27:52
or you've got to warm up more than the 5
27:55
000 meters jim and i did that a few
27:57
years back and we raced the double and
27:59
the single and man remember those that
28:02
lightweight girls ate gym that we were
28:05
we didn't think they were going to make
28:06
it to the starting line it was going to
28:08
be an hour and a half
28:09
it was like an hour up and then it was
28:11
like nine minutes down right
28:17
i got hung up on a buoy i thought i was
28:19
gonna have to call for help but um
28:22
you know i i got off it
28:24
or the river got me off it
28:27
but um
28:28
and so obviously with the weather this
28:31
time of year you know in november first
28:33
week in november things are starting to
28:34
slow down up in the north northeast and
28:36
the upper midwest and things kind of
28:39
shift shift further south so the racing
28:41
the racing season continues and our last
28:43
event that we're gonna post or chat real
28:46
quick about is the head of the south
28:48
which is in augusta georgia and it is
28:50
the next weekend after the head of the
28:52
hooch uh the second weekend of uh
28:55
november and that's a beautiful venue as
28:58
well it's really a nice course it's kind
29:01
of a it's kind of a little s turn course
29:04
and it's it's kind of challenging the
29:06
river widens and narrows and so on so
29:08
it's a very well
29:10
uh well-run and well-respected race in
29:12
the uh
29:13
in the south right the head of the south
29:16
and um
29:17
that's uh that's in augusta georgia and
29:20
then there's gonna be other races as
29:21
well that weekend uh down and around the
29:24
uh state of florida and state of georgia
29:27
and probably in texas and california as
29:29
well
29:30
so there's lots of things still going on
29:32
in november so it's
29:34
it's fun it's good it kind of threw me
29:36
off and i looked at head races because
29:39
you know it's 2022 and then
29:42
so
29:43
just go down to the correct date
29:46
you know whether whether you're a junior
29:48
or an elite athlete you need a a lot of
29:50
water time and a lot of steady state and
29:53
that's what head racing is really all
29:55
about it's about building your base you
29:57
know and getting out there and rowing
29:59
those long distances and stuff like that
30:01
you know that that's one of the reasons
30:03
that head racing really got popular
30:06
because you know physiologically we have
30:08
to know how to build our
30:10
our bodies up in order to to be able to
30:13
do that
30:14
harder racing i mean personally i don't
30:17
think masters should row anything but
30:19
head races you know yeah absolutely
30:21
stuff that really makes sense you know
30:23
banging your head against the wall for a
30:24
thousand meters isn't appealing
30:27
and wasn't it you guys who told me um
30:29
always like train a little longer than
30:31
your head
30:33
right put on another 500 meters or
30:36
whatever
30:37
yeah right and then you're kind of
30:39
psyching your body out a little bit more
30:42
so
30:46
well we are
30:48
kind of coming to the end of our
30:49
discussion unless you guys want to talk
30:51
about some you know general
30:54
tips and tricks and
30:56
uh
30:58
i think the thing with a race is as you
31:00
know we kind of touched on already but
31:02
one of my things is just do a little bit
31:03
of homework i think it's really valuable
31:06
as a scholar or as a coach if you're
31:08
taking your team to a new location for
31:11
example uh just do that homework you
31:13
know how know how far it is from the
31:15
hotel
31:16
to the venue think about race day
31:18
traffic
31:20
think about when you're going to eat
31:22
where you're going to eat you know those
31:24
kind of logistical things that are
31:25
pre-race
31:27
time um really do matter and i think a
31:30
lot of times people get kind of uh
31:32
surprised maybe or they get kind of
31:34
caught behind and nobody wants to be
31:36
caught behind on race day so make sure
31:38
when you're going to places think about
31:40
think about those logistical
31:43
challenges or obstacles and and be ready
31:45
for those and then your race day and
31:47
your athletes or you as the athlete will
31:49
enjoy the day that much more yeah where
31:51
you're going to put your stuff
31:54
well how long it's going to take you to
31:55
get from from
31:57
where you are to the starting line you
32:00
know i mean simple stuff like that
32:01
safely without running on onto the race
32:04
course and
32:05
running into people and getting in
32:07
trouble you know it's right and know the
32:09
rules and know that some of the rules
32:11
are are different at different places
32:13
you know sometimes there's a dock
32:15
a dock time and you will get a penalty
32:18
if you stay on the dock longer than the
32:21
rules allow for at that race some races
32:24
are lackadaisical you know they don't
32:25
really care there's plenty of dock space
32:27
and others they uh they're a little more
32:30
pointed about making sure that you
32:33
follow every rule so i would encourage
32:36
coaches and scholars especially to row
32:39
toxins as well to read the
32:42
uh head race um
32:44
program you know the the rules of racing
32:46
for their specific race because
32:48
everybody's a little different
32:49
there's a lot of
32:50
there's a lot of stuff on youtube where
32:52
you could click in the head of the
32:54
tutorials and
32:55
maybe
32:57
pick up some high school or college
32:59
eight that has a
33:01
a gopro going down the race course so
33:03
you can see what it's like a little bit
33:05
in advance
33:07
yeah
33:07
yeah was that ollie um there's there's
33:10
one or is it another rose
33:13
maybe um
33:15
but you know i think it was a 17 minute
33:20
um
33:21
finish time
33:23
but anyway yeah yeah
33:26
it's all great
33:28
thanks a lot for having us on today
33:30
charlotte appreciate it you're so
33:32
welcome mark and um we're gonna we've
33:35
taken a little time off during the
33:36
summer but we're going to be doing a lot
33:38
of uh
33:40
probably about two episodes a month um
33:43
we're going to be some club spotlights
33:46
so
33:46
uh
33:48
if you have a rowing club that you'd
33:49
like to have featured on the podcast
33:52
um we really want to hear from you and
33:56
we want to we want to highlight it
33:58
because there's some really cool people
33:59
out there in
34:01
in
34:02
you know
34:02
u.s rowing land
34:04
um review us uh subscribe on any of your
34:08
podcast apps on youtube or we have a
34:11
facebook page where our episodes go live
34:14
as well
34:15
and if you use our hashtag
34:18
readyrow.usa it's easy to remember um
34:22
you can win rowing gadgets and gear
34:26
uh like i just had a little takeaways
34:28
slide um we talked about this make a
34:31
race plan and have fun train a little
34:33
longer than your race
34:35
um that's a picture of where i launched
34:38
from at the community rowing on the on
34:41
the charles river upstream from the
34:43
racecourse shot in the morning
34:46
yeah yeah i got so many sunrise shots
34:49
that's true um pierce press is my
34:52
company and all our podcasts are the
34:54
archived on there and it's uh pierce
34:56
press.com
34:58
slash podcasts or you can just use the
35:00
menu
35:01
we also publish books and
35:04
we're doing some new books in our
35:07
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35:10
imprint
35:12
we've won some awards with our
35:14
children's books they're really really
35:15
cool books um a lot of
35:18
stories about diversity and uh
35:21
taking care of the environment
35:24
these are
35:25
listed on our pierce press dot com and
35:28
here's your the club news forum is also
35:30
linked at
35:31
piercepress.com
35:33
so just fill it out and we'll get a hold
35:34
of you and cover your club we
35:38
i think we we're going to do what up a
35:40
rowing center in
35:42
fall river and we've done north cascades
35:45
was last month so
35:48
it's just it's fun talking to these
35:49
people who are doing cool things around
35:51
the country um
35:53
gadgets and gear we also have a forum
35:55
for that and you can find that on the
35:56
website and
35:58
that's about it guys thank you so much
36:02
thank you charlotte we had a good time
36:04
as always as always it's fun to hear
36:06
your stories and your tips and tricks
36:08
thanks so much all right bye-bye okay