Rower Quotes

There's no earthly way of knowing Which direction we are going There's no knowing where we're rowing Or which way the river's flowing Is it raining, is it snowing? Is a hurricane a-blowing? - uh! Not a speck of light is showing So the danger must be growing Are the fires of Hell a-glowing? Is the grisly reaper mowing? Yes! The danger must be growing For the rowers keep on rowing And they're certainly not showing Any signs that they are slowing! A-aa-aaa-aaaah!

There’s no earthly way of knowing Which direction they are going! There’s no knowing where they’re rowing, Or which way the river’s flowing! Not a speck of light is showing, So the danger must be growing, For the rowers keep on rowing, And they’re certainly not showing Any signs that they are slowing. . . .

Prayer that craves a particular commodity, -- anything less than all good, -- is vicious. Prayer is the contemplation of the facts of life from the highest point of view. It is the soliloquy of a beholding and jubilant soul. It is the spirit of God pronouncing his works good. But prayer as a means to effect a private end is meanness and theft. It supposes dualism and not unity in nature and consciousness. As soon as the man is at one with God, he will not beg. He will then see prayer in all action. The prayer of the farmer kneeling in his field to weed it, the prayer of the rower kneeling with the stroke of his oar, are true prayers heard throughout nature, though for cheap ends.

You can always tell the old river hand by the way in which he stretches himself out upon the cushions at the bottom of the boat, and encourages the rowers by telling them anecdotes about the marvellous feats he performed last season.

Round the world and home again That's the sailor's way Faster faster, faster faster There's no earthly way of knowing Which direction we are going There's no knowing where we're rowing Or which way the river's flowing Is it raining, is it snowing Is a hurricane a–blowing Not a speck of light is showing So the danger must be growing Are the fires of Hell a–glowing Is the grisly reaper mowing Yes, the danger must be growing For the rowers keep on rowing And they're certainly not showing Any signs that they are slowing.

How often have I watched, and longed to imitate when I should be free to live as I chose, a rower who had slipped his oars and lay flat on his back in the bottom of the boat, letting it drift with the current, seeing nothing but the sky gliding slowly by above him, his face aglow with a foretaste of happiness and peace!

The feeling, for those seconds, is glorious—it reminds him that he is human, that he is so insignificant as to be utterly free, and he is being guided along gracefully, lovingly, by the hand of Nature—and it frees him, however transiently, from all worry and fear and fury and grief. 'I enjoyed that,' he says aloud, as much to the stars as to the rower.

I AM ROWING (a hex poem) i have cursed your forehead, your belly, your life i have cursed the streets your steps plod through the things your hands touch i have cursed the inside of your dreams i have placed a puddle in your eye so that you cant see anymore an insect in your ear so that you cant hear anymore a sponge in your brain so that you cant understand anymore i have frozen you in the soul of your body iced you in the depths of your life the air you breathe suffocates you the air you breathe has the air of a cellar is an air that has already been exhaled been puffed out by hyenas the dung of this air is something no one can breathe your skin is damp all over your skin sweats out waters of great fear your armpits reak far and wide of the crypt animals drop dead as you pass dogs howl at night their heads raised toward your house you cant run away you cant muster the strength of an ant to the tip of your feet your fatigue makes a lead stump in your body your fatigue is a long caravan your fatigue stretches out to the country of nan your fatigue is inexpressible your mouth bites you your nails scratch you no longer yours, your wife no longer yours, your brother the sole of his foot bitten by an angry snake someone has slobbered on your descendents someone has drooled in the mouth of your laughing little girl someone has walked by slobbering all over the face of your domain the world moves away from you i am rowing i am rowing i am rowing against your life i am rowing i split into countless rowers to row more strongly against you you fall into blurriness you are out of breath you get tired before the slightest effort i row i row i row you go off drunk tied to the tail of a mule drunkenness like a huge umbrella that darkens the sky and assembles the flies dizzy drunkenness of the semicircular canals unnoticed beginnings of hemiplegia drunkeness no longer leaves you lays you out to the left lays you out to the right lays you out on the stony ground of the path i row i row i am rowing against your days you enter the house of suffering i row i row on a black blinfold your life is unfolding on the great white eye of a one eyed horse your future is unrolling I AM ROWING

All unknowns, at first, at least, to me, until I, like Columbus, “discovered” them. Is voyeurism a form of imperialism?

There is a moment in the history of every beaten child when his mind parts with hopes of dignity — pushes off hope like a boat without a rower, and lets it go as it will on the stream, and resigns himself to the tally stick of pain.

When he came back, I hid my face within my hands. He said: "Fear nothing. Who has seen our kiss? --Who saw us? The night and the moon." "And the stars and the first flush of dawn. The moon has seen its visage in the lake, and told it to the water 'neath the willows. The water told it to the rower's oar. "And the oar has told it to the boat, and the boat has passed the secret to the fisher. Alas! alas! if that were only all! But the fisher told the secret to a woman. "The fisher told the secret to a woman: my father and my mother and my sisters, and all of Hellas now shall know the tale.

We take it for granted that life moves forward. You build memories; you build momentum.You move as a rower moves: facing backwards. You can see where you've been, but not where you’re going. And your boat is steered by a younger version of you. It's hard not to wonder what life would be like facing the other way. Avenoir. You'd see your memories approaching for years, and watch as they slowly become real. You’d know which friendships will last, which days are important, and prepare for upcoming mistakes. You'd go to school, and learn to forget. One by one you'd patch things up with old friends, enjoying one last conversation before you meet and go your separate ways. And then your life would expand into epic drama. The colors would get sharper, the world would feel bigger. You'd become nothing other than yourself, reveling in your own weirdness. You'd fall out of old habits until you could picture yourself becoming almost anything. Your family would drift slowly together, finding each other again. You wouldn't have to wonder how much time you had left with people, or how their lives would turn out. You'd know from the start which week was the happiest you’ll ever be, so you could relive it again and again. You'd remember what home feels like, and decide to move there for good. You'd grow smaller as the years pass, as if trying to give away everything you had before leaving. You'd try everything one last time, until it all felt new again. And then the world would finally earn your trust, until you’d think nothing of jumping freely into things, into the arms of other people. You'd start to notice that each summer feels longer than the last. Until you reach the long coasting retirement of childhood. You'd become generous, and give everything back. Pretty soon you’d run out of things to give, things to say, things to see. By then you'll have found someone perfect; and she'll become your world. And you will have left this world just as you found it. Nothing left to remember, nothing left to regret, with your whole life laid out in front of you, and your whole life left behind.

There’s no earthly way of knowing Which direction they are going! There’s no knowing where they’re rowing, Or which way the river’s flowing! Not a speck of light is showing, So the danger must be growing, For the rowers keep on rowing, And they’re certainly not showing Any signs that they are slowing. . . .

On top of his grudge holding, he had a reputation for impatience. Like so many brilliant people, Calvin just couldn’t understand how no one else got it. He was also an introvert, which isn’t really a flaw but often manifests itself as standoffishness. Worst of all, he was a rower. As any non-rower can tell you, rowers are not fun. This is because rowers only ever want to talk about rowing. Get two or more rowers in a room and the conversation goes from normal topics like work or weather to long, pointless stories about boats, blisters, oars, grips, ergs, feathers, workouts, catches, releases, recoveries, splits, seats, strokes, slides, starts, settles, sprints, and whether the water was really “flat” or not. From there, it usually progresses to what went wrong on the last row, what might go wrong on the next row, and whose fault it was and/or will be. At some point the rowers will hold out their hands and compare calluses. If you’re really unlucky, this could be followed by several minutes of head-bowing reverence as one of them recounts the perfect row where it all felt easy.

Even as rowers must subsume their often fierce sense of independence and self-reliance, at the same time they must hold true to their individuality, their unique capabilities as oarsmen or oarswomen or, for that matter, as human beings. p 179

Shandy looked ahead. Blackbeard, apparently willing to get the explanation later, had picked up his oars and was rowing again. 'May I presume to suggest,' yelled Shandy giddily to Davies, 'that we preoceed the hell out of here with all due haste.' Davies pushed a stray lock of hair back from his forehead and sat down on the rower's thwart. 'My dear fellow consider it done.

My ancestors further back than the first Roman were Hebrews." "The stubborn pride of thy race is not lost in thee," said Arrius, observing a flush upon the rower's face. "Pride is never so loud as when in chains." "What cause hast thou for pride?" "That I am a Jew." Arrius smiled.

He nods, quiet for a moment. “I applied to Brown, Cornell and Harvard. I was accepted to all three. I ended up at Harvard because they had the best rowing program.” Damn. Of course he’s a rower. I have a bit of a thing for rowers. Sophomore year I dated two of them. Not at the same time or anything. But still, it was a good year.

No, you’re rushing. It’s one of the worst mistakes a rower can make. Every time you rush the slide, you know what happens? God kills a kitten.” “Oh, for god’s sake, Calvin.

I’m sorry,” he said gently, studying her face the way a meteorologist might watch a storm develop. “Please know you can talk to me. Rower to rower. It’s all confidential.

What’s all this?” he finally said, pointing to her bandaged fingers. “Oh. I’m a rower. Trying to be.” “Are you any good?” “No.” “Then why are you doing it?” “I’m not sure.” He shook his head. “Boy, do I get that.

Like so many brilliant people, Calvin just couldn’t understand how no one else got it. He was also an introvert, which isn’t really a flaw but often manifests itself as standoffishness. Worst of all, he was a rower.

Then on the River I saw the dream-built ship of the god Yoharneth-Lehai, whose great prow lifted grey into the air above the River of Silence. Her timbers were olden dreams dreamed long ago, and poets' fancies made her tall, straight masts, and her rigging was wrought out of the people's hopes. Upon her deck were rowers with dream-made oars, and the rowers were the people of men's fancies, and princes of old story and people who had died, and people who had never been.

talk about rowing. Get two or more rowers in a room and the conversation goes from normal topics like work or weather to long, pointless stories about boats, blisters, oars, grips, ergs, feathers, workouts, catches, releases, recoveries, splits, seats, strokes, slides, starts, settles, sprints, and whether the water was really “flat” or not. From there, it usually progresses to what went wrong on the last row, what might go wrong on the next row, and whose fault it was and/or will be. At some point the rowers will hold out their hands and compare calluses. If you’re really unlucky, this could be followed by several minutes of head-bowing reverence as one of them recounts the perfect row where it all felt easy.

moment in the history of every beaten child when his mind parts with hopes of dignity – pushes off hope like a boat without a rower, and lets it go as it will on the stream, and resigns himself to the tally stick of pain. This is a ferocious

Alison sends a long look out across the river, at the rowers, the ducks, the clouds easing along in parallel with the water line. She is not the first girl I ever kissed, but she remains the one I've kissed the most, in all my life thus far.

The funeral was packed. A few rowers, one reporter, maybe fifty Hastings employees, a handful of whom, despite their bowed heads and somber clothing, weren’t at Calvin’s funeral to grieve, but to gloat. Ding dong, they cheered silently. The king is dead.

Thirteen hours later, Dr. Mason held the infant up for an exhausted Elizabeth to see. “That’s a big one,” he said, looking at the baby as if he’d just reeled in a catch. “Definitely a rower. Don’t quote me, but I think she’ll row port.” He looked down at Elizabeth. “Good job, Miss Zott.

The sound he’d taken for an engine hum? The rowers chanting while a drummer kept the beat. “Row, row, row the boat, toward the Darkling Sea. And there we’ll find some fucking fish, and have a killing spree.” Each time they sang a verse, they cheered. A berserker army on its way to glory.

There's no earthly way of knowing Which direction they are going! There's no knowing where they're rowing, Or which way the river's flowing! Not a speck of light is showing, So the danger must be growing, For the rowers keep on rowing, And they're certainly not showing Any signs that they are slowing. . . .

no one will have any doubt that those are laborious triflers who spend their time on useless literary problems, of whom even among the Romans there is now a great number. It was once a foible confined to the Greeks to inquire into what number of rowers Ulysses had, whether the Iliad or the Odyssey was written first, whether moreover they belong to the same author, and various other matters of this stamp, which, if you keep them to yourself, in no way pleasure your secret soul, and, if you publish them, make you seem more of a bore than a scholar. But now this vain passion for learning useless things has assailed the Romans also.

Then, as she twisted to the right, she revealed her talking partner. I literally broke step, my body deciding before my brain that my presence would not be needed in their interaction. Carol was gorgeous. A tall, confident, amazon of a woman. The lines of her gold lamay dress skimming every curve of her body. She was clearly not wearing underwear. She looked like a glossy magazine perfume ad. And this man was her magazine equal. He was perfect. Tall. Substantial. He looked muscular without giving the impression that he worked out. Maybe he was a rower. Or it could be tennis. Maybe he chopped down trees. Yes, he'd be very good at chopping trees down. I remember feeling an unnaturally strong desire to watch him do that.

From there, it usually progresses to what went wrong on the last row, what might go wrong on the next row, and whose fault it was and/or will be. At some point the rowers will hold out their hands and compare calluses. If you’re really unlucky, this could be followed by several minutes of head-bowing reverence as one of them recounts the perfect row where it all felt easy. —

As any non-rower can tell you, rowers are not fun. This is because rowers only ever want to talk about rowing. Get two or more rowers in a room and the conversation goes from normal topics like work or weather to long, pointless stories about boats, blisters, oars, grips, ergs, feathers, workouts, catches, releases, recoveries, splits, seas, strokes, slides, starts, settles, sprints, and whether the water was really “flat” or not. From there, it usually progresses to what went wrong on the last row, what might go wrong on the next row, and whose fault it was and/or will be. At some point the rowers will hold their hands and compare calluses. If you’re really unlucky, this could be followed by several minutes of head-bowing reverence as one of them recounts the perfect row where it all felt so easy.

After leaving this park the Vivonne began to flow again more swiftly. How often have I watched, and longed to imitate, when I should be free to live as I chose, a rower who had shipped his oars and lay stretched out on his back, his head down, in the bottom of his boat, letting it drift with the current, seeing nothing but the sky which slipped quietly above him, shewing upon his features a foretaste of happiness and peace.

Movement offers us pleasure, identity, belonging and hope. It puts us in places that are good for us, whether that's outdoors in nature, in an environment that challenges us, or with a supportive community. It allows us to redefine ourselves and reimagine what is possible. It makes social connection easier and self-transcendence possible. Each of these benefits can be realized through other means. There are multiple paths to discovery and many ways to build community. Happiness can be found in any number of roles and pastimes; solace can be taken in poetry, prayer or art. Exercise need not replace any of these other sources of meaning and joy. Yet physical activity stands out in its ability to fulfill so many human needs, and that makes it worth considering as a fundamentally valuable endeavour. It is as if what is good in us is most easily activated or accessed through movement. As rower Kimberley Sogge put it, when she described to me why the Head of the Charles Regatta was such a peak experience, "The highest spirit of humanity gets to come out." Ethicist Sigmund Loland came to a similar conclusion, declaring that an exercise pill would be a poor substitute for physical activity. As he wrote, "Rejecting exercise means rejecting significant experiences of being human.

Obviously, she couldn’t possibly be rowing with Evans. An elite rower like Evans would never deign to get in a boat with a novice, even if they were sleeping together. Scratch that; especially if they were sleeping together. Evans probably signed her up for some beginner crew, and Zott, wanting to prove that she could hold her own—per usual—went along with it. He shuddered at the thought of a bunch of struggling rowers, their blades hitting the water like out-of-control spatulas.

As of old Phoenician men, to the Tin Isles sailing Straight against the sunset and the edges of the earth, Chaunted loud above the storm and the strange sea's wailing, Legends of their people and the land that gave them birth- Sang aloud to Baal-Peor, sang unto the horned maiden, Sang how they should come again with the Brethon treasure laden, Sang of all the pride and glory of their hardy enterprise, How they found the outer islands, where the unknown stars arise; And the rowers down below, rowing hard as they could row, Toiling at the stroke and feather through the wet and weary weather, Even they forgot their burden in the measure of a song, And the merchants and the masters and the bondsmen all together, Dreaming of the wondrous islands, brought the gallant ship along; So in mighty deeps alone on the chainless breezes blown In my coracle of verses I will sing of lands unknown, Flying from the scarlet city where a Lord that knows no pity, Mocks the broken people praying round his iron throne, -Sing about the Hidden Country fresh and full of quiet green. Sailing over seas uncharted to a port that none has seen.

Calvin was a brilliant man, but if he had one flaw, it was his ability to hold a grudge. On top of his grudge holding, he had a reputation for impatience. Like so many brilliant people, Calvin just couldn’t understand how no one else got it. He was also an introvert, which isn’t really a flaw but often manifests itself as standoffishness. Worst of all, he was a rower. As any non-rower can tell you, rowers are not fun. This is because rowers only ever want to talk about rowing. Get two or more rowers in a room and the conversation goes from normal topics like work or weather to long, pointless stories about boats, blisters, oars, grips, ergs, feathers, workouts, catches, releases, recoveries, splits, seats, strokes, slides, starts, settles, sprints, and whether the water was really “flat” or not. From there, it usually progresses to what went wrong on the last row, what might go wrong on the next row, and whose fault it was and/or will be. At some point the rowers will hold out their hands and compare calluses. If you’re really unlucky, this could be followed by several minutes of head-bowing reverence as one of them recounts the perfect row where it all felt easy.

Competitive rowing is an undertaking of extraordinary beauty preceded by brutal punishment. Unlike most sports, which draw primarily on particular muscle groups, rowing makes heavy and repeated use of virtually every muscle in the body, despite the fact that a rower, as Al Ulbrickson liked to put it, “scrimmages on his posterior annex.” And rowing makes these muscular demands not at odd intervals but in rapid sequence, over a protracted period of time, repeatedly and without respite. On one occasion, after watching the Washington freshmen practice, the Seattle Post-Intelligencer’s Royal Brougham marveled at the relentlessness of the

I knew nothing about boats, but I immediately loved the landless smells, the oil on the water, brine, fumes sputtering out of the stern, and I came to love the thousand and one sounds of the river around us, that let us be silent as if in a suddenly thoughtful universe within this rushing world. It was resplendent. We almost grazed the arch of a bridge, The Darter leaning his body away at the last minute as if that would make the boat follow him. Then a near collision with a quartet of rowers who were left buffeting in our wash. We heard their yells and witnessed The Darter’s wave towards them as if it were fate, not anyone’s fault.

Kyle says (with glee), “Addicted to breathing? I can fix that. Get on the rower and give me two thousand meters, all out, and vomit! Vomit your guts!—quick, down on the floor, forty push-ups, crack your spine!—quick! Quick! Bench two hundred pounds to muscle failure—die slowly!—burst your clotted chest!—give me one hundred squats in one hundred seconds—no resting, Conte!—pull that five-hundred-pound sled back and forth the length of the floor and stop making those noises! Did I see you eye-fuck the clock? Would you like the Suicide Stairs? Hurry! Hurry! Slam that thirty-pound medicine ball, not on the floor but through it, twenty times, penetrate that floor, Conte, rape it hard and explode your evil heart and balls.

A well-conditioned oarsman or oarswoman competing at the highest levels must be able to take in and consume as much as eight liters of oxygen per minute; an average male is capable of taking in roughly four to five liters at most. Pound for pound, Olympic oarsmen may take in and process as much oxygen as a thoroughbred racehorse. This extraordinary rate of oxygen intake is of only so much value, it should be noted. While 75–80 percent of the energy a rower produces in a two-thousand-meter race is aerobic energy fueled by oxygen, races always begin, and usually end, with hard sprints. These sprints require levels of energy production that far exceed the body’s capacity to produce aerobic energy, regardless of oxygen intake. Instead the body must immediately produce

Life on a floating city must have been really dull if the idea of war sounded intriguing. Trollbella squinted and crossed her arms as she thought about it. “But still, an army in exchange for a broken heart seems like a pretty steep deal,” she said. Without missing a beat, Conner clutched his chest and fell to the deck in pain. “Oh my broken heart! It hurts so much! Oh the pain, the miserable pain!” he screamed. “Your heart is on the other side of your chest, Conner,” Alex whispered down at him and he quickly made the correction. Tears formed in Trollbella’s eyes at the sight of her Butterboy in pain she had caused him. “Oh no, Butterboy!” she said, and rushed to his side. “If my army will help ease your pain, then my army you shall have!” Conner quickly sat up, completely fine. “Thank goodness,” he said. “I really appreciate it! Now we need to gather up your army and fill them in on our plan as soon as possible.” Queen Trollbella got to her feet to address the rowers aboard her boat. “Take us to the army fort at once, troblins!” she ordered. “My Butterboy needs to speak with our army and start his healing process.” The troll and goblin rowers turned the boat completely around and headed in the direction of the army float. Alex gestured for Lester to follow the boat, and helped Conner to his feet. “Nice going,” she whispered in his ear. “Thanks,” Conner said, but his face fell into a pout. “What’s wrong?” she said. “We recruited the troblin army and it was easier than either of us expected!” “I know,” Conner said sadly. “I just can’t believe Trollbella picked that troll over me.

Worst of all, he was a rower. As any non-rower can tell you, rowers are not fun. This is because rowers only ever want to talk about rowing. Get two or more rowers in a room and the conversation goes from normal topics like work or weather to long, pointless stories about boats, blisters, oars, grips, ergs, feathers, workouts, catches, releases, recoveries, splits, seats, strokes, slides, starts, settles, sprints, and whether the water was really “flat” or not. From there, it usually progresses to what went wrong on the last row, what might go wrong on the next row, and whose fault it was and/or will be. At some point the rowers will hold out their hands and compare calluses. If you’re really unlucky, this could be followed by several minutes of head-bowing reverence as one of them recounts the perfect row where it all felt easy.

Like so many brilliant people, Calvin just couldn’t understand how no one else got it. He was also an introvert, which isn’t really a flaw but often manifests itself as standoffishness. Worst of all, he was a rower. As any non-rower can tell you, rowers are not fun. This is because rowers only ever want to talk about rowing. Get two or more rowers in a room and the conversation goes from normal topics like work or weather to long, pointless stories about boats, blisters, oars, grips, ergs, feathers, workouts, catches, releases, recoveries, splits, seats, strokes, slides, starts, settles, sprints, and whether the water was really “flat” or not. From there, it usually progresses to what went wrong on the last row, what might go wrong on the next row, and whose fault it was and/or will be. At some point the rowers will hold out their hands and compare calluses. If you’re really unlucky, this could be followed by several minutes of head-bowing reverence as one of them recounts the perfect row where it all felt easy.

Most people in the Great Britain of (Adam) Smith's day lived in what most of us would regard as poverty. Hundreds of thousands were willing to risk the possibility of death in transit and years in indentured servitude for the chance to escape to the New World. Yet the population of Britain was probably better off economically than that of any major nation on the globe. To put relative poverty and wealth in perspective, let us take the standards of apparel considered necessary by ordinary day laborers, the lowest of the working poor, as recounted in The Wealth of Nations. In England, Smith reports, the poorest day laborer of either sex would be ashamed to appear in public without leather shoes. In Scotland, a rung lower on the ladder of national wealth, it was considered inappropriate for men of this class to appear without shoes, but not for women. In France, a rung rower still, custom held that both men and women laborers could appear shoeless in public. Below France there were many rungs in Europe. And below Europe there were many more rungs still. (p. 56)

She could sense the approach of land- taste when the waters changed, feel when currents turned cool or warm- but it didn't hurt to keep an eye on the shore now and then, and an ear out for boats. The slap of oars could be heard for leagues. Her father had told tales about armored seafarers in days long past, whose trireme ships had three banks of rowers to ply the waters- you could hear them clear down to Atlantica, he'd say. Any louder and they would disrupt the songs of the half-people- the dolphins and whales who used their voices to navigate the waters. Even before her father had enacted the ban on going to the surface, it was rare that a boat would encounter a mer. If the captain kept to the old ways, he would either carefully steer away or throw her a tribute: fruit of the land, the apples and grapes merfolk treasured more than treasure. In return the mermaid might present him with fruit of the sea- gems, or a comb from her hair. But there was always the chance of an unscrupulous crew, and nets, and the potential prize of a mermaid wife or trophy to present the king. (Considering some of the nets that merfolk had found and freed their underwater brethren from, it was quite understandable that Triton believed humans might eat anything they found in the sea- including merfolk.)

Cohen continued to struggle with his own well-being. Even though he had achieved his life’s dream of running his own firm, he was still unhappy, and he had become dependent on a psychiatrist named Ari Kiev to help him manage his moods. In addition to treating depression, Kiev’s other area of expertise was success and how to achieve it. He had worked as a psychiatrist and coach with Olympic basketball players and rowers trying to improve their performance and overcome their fear of failure. His background building athletic champions appealed to Cohen’s unrelenting need to dominate in every transaction he entered into, and he started asking Kiev to spend entire days at SAC’s offices, tending to his staff. Kiev was tall, with a bushy mustache and a portly midsection, and he would often appear silently at a trader’s side and ask him how he was feeling. Sometimes the trader would be so startled to see Kiev there he’d practically jump out of his seat. Cohen asked Kiev to give motivational speeches to his employees, to help them get over their anxieties about losing money. Basically, Kiev was there to teach them to be ruthless. Once a week, after the market closed, Cohen’s traders would gather in a conference room and Kiev would lead them through group therapy sessions focused on how to make them more comfortable with risk. Kiev had them talk about their trades and try to understand why some had gone well and others hadn’t. “Are you really motivated to make as much money as you can? This guy’s going to help you become a real killer at it,” was how one skeptical staff member remembered Kiev being pitched to them. Kiev’s work with Olympians had led him to believe that the thing that blocked most people was fear. You might have two investors with the same amount of money: One was prepared to buy 250,000 shares of a stock they liked, while the other wasn’t. Why? Kiev believed that the reluctance was a form of anxiety—and that it could be overcome with proper treatment. Kiev would ask the traders to close their eyes and visualize themselves making trades and generating profits. “Surrendering to the moment” and “speaking the truth” were some of his favorite phrases. “Why weren’t you bigger in the trades that worked? What did you do right?” he’d ask. “Being preoccupied with not losing interferes with winning,” he would say. “Trading not to lose is not a good strategy. You need to trade to win.” Many of the traders hated the group therapy sessions. Some considered Kiev a fraud. “Ari was very aggressive,” said one. “He liked money.” Patricia, Cohen’s first wife, was suspicious of Kiev’s motives and believed that he was using his sessions with Cohen to find stock tips. From Kiev’s perspective, he found the perfect client in Cohen, a patient with unlimited resources who could pay enormous fees and whose reputation as one of the best traders on Wall Street could help Kiev realize his own goal of becoming a bestselling author. Being able to say that you were the

Hello, my name is Francine Luftson and I’m from San Diego! And I just want to say, I’m such a fan even if you don’t believe in God! I was just wondering: Is there some sort of diet you recommend? I know I need to lose weight, but I really don’t want to feel hungry. I do take diet pills every day. Thank you!” “Thanks, Francine,” Elizabeth said. “But I can clearly see that you are not overweight. Therefore, I have to assume you’ve been unduly influenced by the relentless imagery of the too-thin women that now fill our magazines, destroying your morale and submerging your self-worth. Instead of dieting and taking pills—” She paused. “Can I ask?” she said. “How many people in this audience take diet pills?” A few nervous hands went up. Elizabeth waited. Most of the other hands went up. “Stop taking those pills,” she demanded. “They’re amphetamines. They can lead to psychosis.” “But I don’t like to exercise,” Francine said. “Maybe you haven’t found the right exercise.” “I watch Jack LaLanne.” At the mention of Jack’s name, Elizabeth closed her eyes. “What about rowing?” she said, suddenly tired. “Rowing?” “Rowing,” she repeated, opening her eyes. “It’s a brutal form of recreation designed to test every muscle in your body and mind. It takes place before dawn, too often in the rain. It results in thick calluses. It broadens the arms, chest, and thighs. Ribs crack; hands blister. Rowers sometimes ask themselves, ‘Why am I doing this?’ ” “Jeepers,” Francine said, worried. “Rowing sounds awful!” Elizabeth looked confused. “My point is rowing precludes the need for both diet and pills. It’s also good for your soul.” “But I thought you didn’t believe in souls.” Elizabeth sighed. She closed her eyes again. Calvin. Are you actually saying women can’t row?

The Peloponnesians arranged their ships in such a manner as to make the largest possible circle without leaving space to break through, turning their prows outwards and their sterns inwards; within the circle they placed the smaller craft which accompanied them, and five of their swiftest ships that they might be close at hand and row out at whatever point the enemy charged them. The Athenians ranged their ships in a single line and sailed round and round the Peloponnesian fleet, which they drove into a narrower and narrower space, almost touching as they passed, and leading the crews to suppose that they were on the point of charging. But they had been warned by Phormio not to begin until he gave the signal, for he was hoping that the enemy's ships, not having the steadiness of an army on land, would soon fall into disorder and run foul of one another; they would be embarrassed by the small craft, and if the usual morning breeze, for which he continued waiting as he sailed round them, came down from the gulf, they would not be able to keep still for a moment. He could attack whenever he pleased, because his ships were better sailers; and he knew that this would be the right time. When the breeze began to blow, the ships, which were by this time crowded into a narrow space and were distressed at once by the force of the wind and by the small craft which were knocking up against them, fell into confusion; ship dashed against ship, and they kept pushing one another away with long poles; there were cries of 'keep off' and noisy abuse, so that nothing could be heard either of the word of command or of the coxswains' giving the time; and the difficulty which unpractised rowers had in clearing the water in a heavy sea made the vessels disobedient to the helm.At that moment Phormio gave the signal; the Athenians, falling upon the enemy, began by sinking one of the admirals' vessels, and then wherever they went made havoc of them. (Book 2 Chapter 83.5-84.3)

Suppose you entered a boat race. One hundred rowers, each in a separate rowboat, set out on a ten-mile race along a wide and slow-moving river. The first to cross the finish line will win $10,000. Halfway into the race, you’re in the lead. But then, from out of nowhere, you’re passed by a boat with two rowers, each pulling just one oar. No fair! Two rowers joined together into one boat! And then, stranger still, you watch as that rowboat is overtaken by a train of three such rowboats, all tied together to form a single long boat. The rowers are identical septuplets. Six of them row in perfect synchrony while the seventh is the coxswain, steering the boat and calling out the beat for the rowers. But those cheaters are deprived of victory just before they cross the finish line, for they in turn are passed by an enterprising group of twenty-four sisters who rented a motorboat. It turns out that there are no rules in this race about what kinds of vehicles are allowed. That was a metaphorical history of life on Earth. For the first billion years or so of life, the only organisms were prokaryotic cells (such as bacteria). Each was a solo operation, competing with others and reproducing copies of itself. But then, around 2 billion years ago, two bacteria somehow joined together inside a single membrane, which explains why mitochondria have their own DNA, unrelated to the DNA in the nucleus.35 These are the two-person rowboats in my example. Cells that had internal organelles could reap the benefits of cooperation and the division of labor (see Adam Smith). There was no longer any competition between these organelles, for they could reproduce only when the entire cell reproduced, so it was “one for all, all for one.” Life on Earth underwent what biologists call a “major transition.”36 Natural selection went on as it always had, but now there was a radically new kind of creature to be selected. There was a new kind of vehicle by which selfish genes could replicate themselves. Single-celled eukaryotes were wildly successful and spread throughout the oceans.

Live seeking God, and then you will not live without God." And more than ever before, all within me and around me lit up, and the light did not again abandon me. And I was saved from suicide. When and how this change occurred I could not say. As imperceptibly and gradually the force of life in me had been destroyed and I had reached the impossibility of living, a cessation of life and the necessity of suicide, so imperceptibly and gradually did that force of life return to me. And strange to say the strength of life which returned to me was not new, but quite old the same that had borne me along in my earliest days. I quite returned to what belonged to my earliest childhood and youth. I returned to the belief in that Will which produced me and desires something of me. I returned to the belief that the chief and only aim of my life is to be better, i.e. to live in accord with that Will, and I returned to the belief that I can find the expression of that Will in what humanity, in the distant past hidden from, has produced for its guidance: that is to say, I returned to a belief in God, in moral perfection, and in a tradition transmitting the meaning of life. There was only this difference, that then all this was accepted unconsciously, while now I knew that without it I could not live. What happened to me was something like this: I was put into a boat (I do not remember when) and pushed off from an unknown shore, shown the direction of the opposite shore, had oars put into my unpracticed hands, and was left alone. I rowed as best I could and moved forward; but the further I advanced towards the middle of the stream the more rapid grew the current bearing me away from my goal and the more frequently did I encounter others, like myself, borne away by the stream. There were a few rowers who continued to row, there were others who had abandoned their oars; there were large boats and immense vessels full of people. Some struggled against the current, others yielded to it. And the further I went the more, seeing the progress down the current of all those who were adrift, I forgot the direction given me. In the very centre of the stream, amid the crowd of boats and vessels which were being borne down-stream, I quite lost my direction and abandoned my oars. Around me on all sides, with mirth and rejoicing, people with sails and oars were borne down the stream, assuring me and each other that no other direction was possible. And I believed them and floated with them. And I was carried far; so far that I heard the roar of the rapids in which I must be shattered, and I saw boats shattered in them. And I recollected myself. I was long unable to understand what had happened to me. I saw before me nothing but destruction, towards which I was rushing and which I feared. I saw no safety anywhere and did not know what to do; but, looking back, I perceived innumerable boats which unceasingly and strenuously pushed across the stream, and I remembered about the shore, the oars, and the direction, and began to pull back upwards against the stream and towards the shore. That shore was God; that direction was tradition; the oars were the freedom given me to pull for the shore and unite with God. And so the force of life was renewed in me and I again began to live.

On the ergometer beside me the team’s best male rower, Aubrey Olsen, sat down on the sliding seat, dropped his feet into the heel cups of the Concept 2 ergometer, and strapped them securely to the footboards. He smiled at me, confident but wary that he was going to have to go hard against me (I didn’t have an intimidating build for an offensive lineman, but I did for a rower).

The tools a competitive rower uses to prepare to race are useful for the everyday rower, as well. They include double workouts (exercising two times per day), weight lifting, core exercises, and cross-training such as cycling.

When he had made all the necessary preparations the army began to embark at the approach of the dawn; while according to custom he offered sacrifice to the gods and to the river Hydaspes, as the prophets directed. When he had embarked he poured a libation into the river from the prow of the ship out of a golden goblet, invoking the Acesines as well as the Hydaspes, because he had ascertained that it is the largest of all the rivers which unite with the Hydaspes, and that their confluence was not far off. He also invoked the Indus, into which the Acesines flows after its junction with the Hydaspes. Moreover he poured out libations to his forefather Heracles, to Ammon, and the other gods to whom he was in the habit of sacrificing, and then he ordered the signal for starting seawards to be given with the trumpet. As soon as the signal was given they commenced the voyage in regular order; for directions had been given at what distance apart it was necessary for the baggage vessels to be arranged, as also for the vessels conveying the horses and for the ships of war; so that they might not fall foul of each other by sailing down the channel at random. He did not allow even the fast-sailing ships to get out of rank by outstripping the rest. The noise of the rowing was never equalled on any other occasion, inasmuch as it proceeded from so many ships rowed at the same time; also the shouting of the boatswains giving the time for beginning and stopping the stroke of the oars, and the clamour of the rowers, when keeping time all together with the dashing of the oars, made a noise like a battle-cry. The banks of the river also, being in many places higher than the ships, and collecting the sound into a narrow space, sent back to each other an echo which was very much increased by its very compression. In some parts too the groves of trees on each side of the river helped to swell the sound, both from the solitude and the reverberation of the noise. The horses which were visible on the decks of the transports struck the barbarians who saw them with such surprise that those of them who were present at the starting of the fleet accompanied it a long way from the place of embarkation. For horses had never before been seen on board ships in the country of India; and the natives did not call to mind that the expedition of Dionysus into India was a naval one. The shouting of the rowers and the noise of the rowing were heard by the Indians who had already submitted to Alexander, and these came running down to the river’s bank and accompanied him singing their native songs. For the Indians have been eminently fond of singing and dancing since the time of Dionysus and those who under his bacchic inspiration traversed the land of the Indians with him.

Orpheus literally had his hands full, holding on to her while she struggled to break away from him and plunge into the water, time after time. How the other Argonauts laughed! Jason was exasperated. He needed Orpheus to keep the rowers working together and he was short by three men since the battle. He couldn’t spare anyone else from the crew to keep the girl from killing herself. When he ordered Herakles to grab her and tie her to the mast, our “dove” showed us that she spoke our language well enough to spew blistering curses and threats. “Listen to that!” Herakles exclaimed with an exaggerated shudder. “She’s a witch’s daughter, sure enough. She’ll put a spell on me if I offend her.” “Stop that nonsense and control the brat,” Jason snapped. “Alas, beloved prince, I can’t.” Herakles sighed and hung his head with such a pathetic air that Milo, Hylas, and I stuffed our knuckles into our mouths to stifle snickers. “I made a vow to Hera not to touch a woman until we come to Colchis.” That was too much for Hylas. He burst into hoots of laughter, and Milo and I joined in, until we had to clutch one another to keep from falling over. I was still trying to catch my breath when Jason’s foot shot out and dealt me an undeniable kick in the behind. “You think this is funny? You watch her!” he barked at me. “If anything happens to the scrawny little bitch, we’ll stick you in a dress, hand you over to her flea-bitten relatives, and be halfway to Colchis before they figure out they’ve been duped. If you’re lucky, they’ll kill you quickly. If not, they might decide to use their knives to turn you into the daughter they lost. See if you can laugh your way out of that, boy!” He showed his teeth in a satisfied smirk and didn’t understand why I kept on laughing at his threat, even while I walked off to assume my new job as the girl’s keeper.

Equally influential is Dr. Caldwell Esselstyn’s book Prevent and Reverse Heart Disease. A former surgeon at the Cleveland Clinic, as well as a Yale-trained rower who garnered Olympic gold at the 1956 Melbourne Summer Games, Dr. Esselstyn concludes from a twenty-year nutritional study that a plant-based, whole-food diet can not only prevent and stop the progression of heart disease, but also reverse its effects.

The good news was that the smoke, whatever its source, was not getting closer to us. The bad news was that it was moving towards Oban. We wasted no time rowing across the loch. The group we’d already sent over remained visible and clearly busy, though doing what was anybody’s guess from our vantage point in the birlinn. It was getting on past noon, and I hated the idea of leaving the birlinn behind. Crafting it had been a singularly powerful experience, one that I wasn’t sure was repeatable. The birlinn we’d made was unique. In the end, though, it was a boat. It wasn’t alive like the three hundred people we were trying to keep breathing. Not to mention the thousands in Oban who could die. I’d planned to take one of the oars to give a rower a break, but I must have looked haggard. When I’d gone to offer, the bloke with the oar had taken one look at me and said, “Naw, mate.” Sitting on a thwart next to Eilidh, I fervently wished for something to distract me from the radiating warmth on my left. Rowing would at least give me something to do that wasn’t thinking about that heat or second guessing all the decisions we’d made in the past few days. We could have taken the strongest of us and returned to Oban, leaving the other three hundred to take the slower route around the loch. Sure, that was a possibility. But if we’d done that, we’d have left them vulnerable, including the children. That wasn’t acceptable to me or to anyone else. Oban had the advantage of numbers and at least some preparation at this point; the people with us did not. There were any number of things we could be questioning, but if we sat here picking apart the instincts we’d followed, all we’d do was pick up an ulcer. We were still alive. That was all that mattered. I tuned back in to the birlinn to hear a couple of the rowers talking, both of them darting glances at me and Eilidh in the process. “. . . wrecked all of Sackington’s guns and stole his grenades,” one of them said, not really trying to be quiet. Eilidh zeroed in on him like a bloodhound catching a whiff of the quarry. “Yes. We did.” “Erm, he wasn’t saying it was a bad thing!” one of the rowers blurted out. “Yes, I was! We could have used those instead of hitting things with sticks, for fuck’s sake,” the other one said. “No offense.” “Mate, they don’t even work anymore,” I said, and when I could almost see his thoughts pivot to but there’s magic now, I sighed. “We happened to be present when someone figured out how to use their magic to fire a rifle at one of Bawbag’s simulacra. Not only did the bullet literally bounce right back, but it killed his daughter when it ricocheted, and his next shot was dead on. Can you guess what happened then?” “He died,” said the guy who had tried to reassure me they weren’t questioning that decision. He had sandy brown hair that was a mess of waves half stuck to his head with sweat from the exertion, and his muscles were bulging out of his shirt—guess he was getting those Strength increases. “Did he die?” the other bloke asked. “Aye, he might as well have just shot himself in the heart. Even swords bounced right off that damn thing—piercing it with the point seems to be the only thing even marginally successful, and that might be imbuing it with Purifire more than the actual poke.” “I know how to shoot a gun,” Eilidh said bluntly. “And amateurs with firearms tend to hurt much more than they help, let alone in a state of active combat. This isn’t the fucking Wild West.” She sounded Done with a capital D, and I didn’t blame her. To his credit, the bloke seemed to mull that over for a bit before nodding as if ceding the point. Whatever the Ascended Alliance knew about friendly fire of an arcane nature, that did not extend to human-made explosives. If

A study of skydivers compared to a control group (rowers) found that repeat skydivers were more likely to experience anhedonia, a lack of joy, in the rest of their lives.

Don’t let him die!” he commanded her loudly. She felt impotent. She could not even tell him how helpless she felt. She saw him crouch and thought he would crawl the the boat to help her somehow. Instead he stood, peg and foot braved. He turned his back on her and the rowers and faced into the storm that opposed them. He threw his head to it. The wind flapped his white shirt-sleeves against his arms and streamed his black, black hair out behind him. “NO!” he roared into it. “Not now! Not when I am so close! You can’t have me and you can’t have my ship! By Sa, by El, by Eda, by the God of Fishes, by every god nameless and not, I swear you shall not have me nor mine!” He held out his hands, his fingers like claws, as if he would grapple with the wind that defied them.

World-class rower Craig Lambert has described how it feels in Mind Over Water (Houghton Mifflin, 1998): Rowers have a word for this frictionless state: swing. . . . Recall the pure joy of riding on a backyard swing: an easy cycle of motion, the momentum coming from the swing itself. The swing carries us; we do not force it. We pump our legs to drive our arc higher, but gravity does most of the work. We are not so much swinging as being swung. The boat swings you. The shell wants to move fast: Speed sings in its lines and nature. Our job is simply to work with the shell, to stop holding it back with our thrashing struggles to go faster. Trying too hard sabotages boat speed. Trying becomes striving and striving undoes itself. Social climbers strive to be aristocrats but their efforts prove them no such thing. Aristocrats do not strive; they have already arrived. Swing is a state of arrival. The

Land sakes, I can’t make a speech,” she said. “Tell you what: I’ll recite a poem I composed while in jail.” And she began. “Although in jail in Centerboro, I do not fret or stew or worro. And confidently I confront The judge, because I’m innosunt. Tho I’m a cow, I am no coward I have not flinched when thunder rowered. When lightning flashed I’ve merely giggled Like one whose funnybone is tiggled. And I shall never give up hoping That soon the jail front door will oping And I’ll once more enjoy my freedom On Bean’s green fields. When last I seed ’em They were a fair and lovely vision And so for my return I’m wishun. I hope that Bismuth will get his’n And spend a good long time in prison.

On a long sea voyage the rowers of Carib merchant canoes kept a small brazier of coals going amidships. Every 30 minutes or so, a small wad of tobacco leaves was placed on the brazier and, as the smoke began to rise, the rowers would put a forked nose pipe made from the breastbone of a seabird into the fumes and draw them in. After holding the smoke for awhile, a rower would exhale powerfully with a shout like high school players breaking a football huddle and then go back to the awesome task of single-handedly rowing a fully loaded commercial canoe over the open seas.

First Week of January 2013 Continuation of my Message to Andy (part 5)   Hi Andy, Are you back from your Tasmanian rowing expedition? Did your team win? I hope so. If I remember correctly, you were always an excellent rower and your teammates at Daltonbury Hall venerated your feathering mastery. I’d love to hear your adventures.☺   Back To My OBSS Escapades   As we headed to Jules’ makeshift office (a classroom temporarily converted), Kim was overtly skittish. He had surmised we would be consigned to cleaning the OBSS lavatories as punishment for our playful misdemeanour. I assured the teenager that that wouldn’t be the case; a more propitious outcome would be in order. Yet, he continued to brood, blaming me for my impertinence. Instead of arguing with him, I kept silent.               I couldn’t help but notice a sardonic smug on Jules’ handsome face when we entered. “Young, will you keep watch outside while I have a word with this young man?” he instructed. I sat on a nearby bench, waiting my turn. Minutes passed, and I needed to use the restroom. I wasn’t sure if I should leave, in the event I would be called upon, but I decided to go. Just as I was finishing my business, I heard a commotion outside. In states of disarray, my leader and tent-mate were being escorted out of the office by a couple of burly guards from the senior officer’s HQ. I was shocked to witness such an unanticipated occurrence. For a brief moment, Kim looked my direction before they marched into the darkness. The unforgettable terror on his face was of a man about to be hanged. It didn’t take long for rumours to circulate around camp that the two were caught red-handed doing unspeakable things to one another. Yet, none of the gossipmongers could provide a definitive account. The next day, Jules and Kim were gone. They had both been hastily expelled without having a chance to say goodbye. My three remaining days at OBSS, I was flummoxed. It was my final evening in Singapore when the truth came to light. My ex-OBSS leader was coming out of a bar in Bugis Street when I stumbled upon him. It was then that I heard the entire narrative from the horse’s mouth.

Rurik was the Clovis of Russia. When with his band of followers he was established at Novgorod the name of Russia came into existence, supposedly from the Finnish word ruotsi, meaning rowers or sea-farers.

oxygen per minute; an average male is capable of taking in roughly four to five liters at most. Pound for pound, Olympic oarsmen may take in and process as much oxygen as a thoroughbred racehorse. This extraordinary rate of oxygen intake is of only so much value, it should be noted. While 75–80 percent of the energy a rower produces in a two-thousand-meter race is aerobic energy fueled by oxygen, races always begin, and usually end, with hard sprints. These sprints require levels of energy production that far exceed the body’s capacity to produce aerobic energy, regardless of oxygen intake. Instead the body must

I have often wondered how this circumpolar stars between the Drago and the Lion came to be known as the Great Bear. The ancient Egyptians called them the Unwearied Ones or the Rowers of the Ships of Ra. I prefer the Plough or the Wain or even the Big Dipper. The name of the Septriones, the proud walkers, grips the imagination, but the Great Bear is a plain misnomer.

I am going to him whom my soul hath loved, or rather who hath loved me with an everlasting love; which is the whole ground of all my consolation. . . . I am leaving the ship of the church in a storm, but whilst the great Pilot is in it the loss of a poor under-rower will be inconsiderable. Live and pray and hope and wait patiently and do not despair; the promise stands invincible that he will never leave thee nor forsake thee. JOHN OWEN, LETTER TO CHARLES FLEETWOOD, AUGUST 22, 1683

Are you the staying at Degas’ mansion?” he asked. “Yes,” Nora said. “I’m Nora. And you are?” “Professor Brooklyn Thomas,” he said. “I study snakes and, well, as you can see, I’m helping Degas recapture this particular one.” “Not much help, are you?” Tina said with a snicker. The professor colored. “Yes. Well… I’m more of an academic than a field man.” He rubbed at his hands, and scratched a mosquito bite.  Nora, who was looking at his callused hands, thought that he in fact looked more like a field man than an academic. He was extremely fit, with the physique of an Olympic rower, and a tanned handsome face. Degas reappeared, looking flushed and pleased. “Got him,” he said. “We got him, professor.” “Excellent,” the professor said.

I have cursed your forehead your belly your life I have cursed the streets your steps plod through The things your hands pick up I have cursed the inside of your dreams I have set a puddle in your eye that can't see any more An insect in your ear that can't hear any more A sponge in your brain that can't understand any more I have frozen you in the soul of your body Iced you in the depths of your life The air you breathe suffocates you The air you breathe has the air of a cellar Is an air that has already been exhaled been puffed out by hyenas The dung of this air is something no one can breathe Your skin is damp all over Your skin sweats out waters of the great fear Your armpits reek far and wide of the crypt Animals stop dead as you pass Dogs howl at night, their heads raised toward your house You can't run away You can't muster the strength of an ant to the tip of your feet Your fatigue makes a lead stump in your body Your fatigue is a long caravan Your fatigue stretches out to the country of Nan Your fatigue is inexpressible Your mouth bites you Your nails scratch you No longer yours, your wife No longer yours, your brother The sole of his foot bitten by an angry snake Someone has slobbered on your descendants Someone has slobbered on the laugh of your little girl Someone has walked slobbering by the face of your domain The world moves away from you I am rowingo I am rowing I am rowing against your life I am rowing I split into countless rowers To row more strongly against you You fall into blurriness You are out of breath You get tired before the slightest effort I row I row I row

It is certainly in everyone’s interest that the ship does not founder but, I put it to you, it is perhaps not in the interest of the rowers that they know of every shoal avoided, every collision fended off. It would only serve to worry them and put them off their stroke. What the rowers need to know is how to row, hmm?

A well-conditioned oarsman or oarswoman competing at the highest levels must be able to take in and consume as much as eight liters of oxygen per minute; an average male is capable of taking in roughly four to five liters at most. Pound for pound, Olympic oarsmen may take in and process as much oxygen as a thoroughbred racehorse. This extraordinary rate of oxygen intake is of only so much value, it should be noted. While 75–80 percent of the energy a rower produces in a two-thousand-meter race is aerobic energy fueled by oxygen, races always begin, and usually end, with hard sprints. These sprints require levels of energy production that far exceed the body’s capacity to produce aerobic energy, regardless of oxygen intake. Instead the body must immediately produce anaerobic energy. This, in turn, produces large quantities of lactic acid, and that acid rapidly builds up in the tissue of the muscles. The consequence is that the muscles often begin to scream in agony almost from the outset of a race and continue screaming until the very end. And it’s not only the muscles that scream. The skeletal system to which all those muscles are attached also undergoes tremendous strains and stresses. Without proper training and conditioning—and sometimes even with them—competitive rowers are apt to experience a wide variety of ills in the knees, hips, shoulders, elbows, ribs, neck, and above all the spine. These injuries and complaints range from blisters to severe tendonitis, bursitis, slipped vertebrae, rotator cuff dysfunction, and stress fractures, particularly fractures of the ribs. The common denominator in all these conditions—whether in the lungs, the muscles, or the bones—is overwhelming pain. And that is perhaps the first and most fundamental thing that all novice oarsmen must learn about competitive rowing in the upper echelons of the sport: that pain is part and parcel of the deal. It’s not a question of whether you will hurt, or of how much you will hurt; it’s a question of what you will do, and how well you will do it, while pain has her wanton way with you.

Od początku istnienia w 2008 roku w Ecoride mieliśmy przyjemność dostarczyć ponad 100 000 rowerów elektrycznych w Szwecji i Europie Północnej. To sprawiło, że my i nasi sprzedawcy specjalizujemy się w rowerach elektrycznych. Pomożemy Ci wybrać odpowiedni model w odpowiedniej cenie, ale przede wszystkim specjalizujemy się w utrzymaniu Twojego e-roweru w ruchu - rok po roku.

Being heavy is not a virtue in itself for rowers, but strength is. Strength comes from muscle, and muscle is heavy.

poor, of the decrepit, the old and the distressed,’ wrote the historian. ‘In that dreadful year, when famine and mortality, going hand in hand, stalked everywhere, mowing down mankind by the thousands, Shitab Rai heard that the grain was a little cheaper, and in greater plenty in Benares, and set apart a sum of thirty thousand rupees,* and directed that the boats and rowers belonging to his household should bring regularly to Patna, three times a month, the grain provided at Benares.

The fundamental thing moving the boat is the understanding that seven other rowers are suffering just as much as you are. Until they stop, you don’t stop. You can’t believe they continue, but they do. It’s thousands of hours of training side by side, wondering who’s going to break, just to become teammates in a long, skinny boat, wondering how the hell you’re still going 750 metres into the race.

Did you get a VO2Max? They are a bit hard to come by, but tend to cost under $100. They can also be estimated using your two-kilometer rowing time on a Concept 2 rower. Though not as good, these machines are at least widely available, being found in most gyms. VO2Max measures your ability to huff and puff. It’s the maximum rate you can use oxygen. The higher the healthier, and it is a great exercise marker because many things must be operating well to get a good score. If your exercise is effective, your VO2Max will climb. This is a good way to monitor your overall progress.

22. The Other Side of the River Mom, Dad, and 2 kids have come to a river, where they find a boat.  It is small and can only carry one adult or 2 kids at a time.  Both kids are good rowers, but how can the whole family reach the other side of the river?

He understood this man too was a slave to greater forces, just as Egil was—that his deeds and words were the last scribblings of a simple rower on a mighty ship, trapped in seething waves, never to be written in any tales.

Nobody Home: Until we're ready, we're pretty much primed for denial. Even on the river of change, we're most of us slow rowers.

Rowers have a word for this frictionless state: swing. . . . Recall the pure joy of riding on a backyard swing: an easy cycle of motion, the momentum coming from the swing itself. The swing carries us; we do not force it. We pump our legs to drive our arc higher, but gravity does most of the work. We are not so much swinging as being swung. The boat swings you. The shell wants to move fast: Speed sings in its lines and nature. Our job is simply to work with the shell, to stop holding it back with our thrashing struggles to go faster. Trying too hard sabotages boat speed. Trying becomes striving and striving undoes itself. Social climbers strive to be aristocrats but their efforts prove them no such thing. Aristocrats do not strive; they have already arrived. Swing is a state of arrival.

The core idea of daily adaptation seems so obvious to me that it should not have to be stated. It goes against the grain for a competitive rower and rowing coach to advocate “moderate” rather than competitive rowing. Exercising every day seems extreme rather than moderate to many people. And rowing on a machine is not perceived as fun.

In the east the Swedes settled along the rivers flowing down to the Black Sea where they created the first states in the region; the locals called them ‘rowers’ or Rus, and so their kingdom was named Kievan Rus, and later Russia.

life is a river and we’re all rowing against the flow. On one bank are the probabilities; on the other, the possibilities. It’s up to us rowers to choose which bank to hug.

Rower to prostota, a prostota to szczęście.

Miles looked so cute, squished on a couch between Will and Trevin. He was polite, too, a gentleman. A fricking sexy gentleman with the biceps of a Harvard crew rower and a smile that truly made her heart throb.

A good swing does not necessarily make crews go faster, except to the extent that if no one’s actions check the run of the boat, rowers get more bang for their buck on each stroke. Mainly what it does is allow them to conserve power, to row at a lower stroke rate and still move through the water as efficiently as possible,

Worst of all, he was a rower.