My First Regatta (December 2018)

Tomorrow is my first Regatta. I'm standing in front of the mirror, wearing the Shellharbour City Rowing Club team uniform. Its racing Lycra. A yellow tank top and blue shorts. Figure hugging in all the worst places. It doesn't look pretty on a Masters Rower.

There’s the sad bulge of my stomach. I can hide it under regular clothing, but the Lycra reveals all. I can see my nipples clearly standing to attention. I never wear sleeveless shirts, so the tank top exposes lily white skin, like I'm wearing an invisible T-Shirt. And the less said about the whole crotch area the better. Please don't draw attention to it.

I walk out to the lounge room to ask Denise for a second opinion. She can't stop laughing long enough to give me an answer. I'm having second thoughts about this Regatta already. 

I change into my regular clothes and drive over to the clubhouse. We are loading sculls onto a big trailer for the drive to Penrith tomorrow morning. I'm here to "help". My Dad is a retired truck driver, but I can't even tie a knot. I have no clue how to secure or tow a trailer.

My father comes from a world of cars and mechanics, plumbing and power tools. To my teenage-self, it all seemed so mundane. I spent my days in the imaginative worlds of novels and computer games. The world of the mind. A world of drama and elegance. Everything my father tried to teach me seemed so... earthbound. Dirty, practical, tedious. I would not listen to him.

So now, when there is any kind of practical work to be done, I stand around like a useless lump. I'm reduced to the role of fetcher and holder, while proper adults do the work that need to be done. Right now, I'm following James around like a clueless apprentice, trying to figure out how I might be useful.

James teaches welding at TAFE, and is studying Engineering at Uni. He is deft and sure with his hands. I am clumsy, gangly, uncertain. Why did I never listen to my Dad? He was (and still is) so patient and willing to teach me this stuff.

I can't detach the rigger off this scull. No matter how much I jiggle it. My coach Heather comes over to help. With single, one-handed jab of her palm, it comes away cleanly in her hand. One smooth motion. That’s what physical competence looks like.

We get the trailer loaded, and I head home for an early night. I’m in bed by 9pm, but my restless brain won't allow me to sleep. I'm too excited and anxious about my first ever race tomorrow. I toss and turn past 2am. Every time I think about rowing, I get a hot flush of adrenalin and have to kick off my blankets. When the alarm goes off, I’m exhausted and bleary.

The 'Reindeer Regatta" is held in December at the Sydney International Regatta Centre. It’s the same place where they held the 2000 Olympic rowing events. It looks very swish, expensive and formal compared to our small club in Oak Flats.

Denise and her mother Suzanne are coming with me to support me. We leave home later than planned and get caught in a traffic jam. I'm tracking the time and Google Maps nervously because my race "Novice Single Sculls" is one of the first races of the day.

Lucky for me, my coach Heather and the boat trailer arrived at the venue early. I'm in constant contact with Heather over text message. They have already unloaded and prepped my scull at the water’s edge. When I arrive, Denise drives me directly to the jetty. I step out of the car and, like a rock star, my crew is waiting with everything set up and ready to go. I head directly for the water and climb straight into my scull.

I'm full of embarrassed apologies for my late arrival, but Heather dismisses it immediately. Heather taught me to row about a year ago, and has been preparing me for racing over the last 3 months (since Part 1 of my Rowing Diary). Now Heather just wants to get me in the right mental state for competition.

My team mates hand me my oars and help me get set up. Heather talks calmly. She doesn't want overload me with last minute instructions, so she just goes over a couple of things we've been talking about for months. Then they push me out onto the water.

It's still 25 minutes until my race. So I have plenty of time to warm up as I row lightly towards the racing area. The Sydney Regatta Centre is purpose designed for this type of event. So athletes have a whole separate small lake to warm up on before the race. When I'm feeling good I head over towards the racing entry.

There’s a sign attached to the front of my scull that says “N5”. That means I'm in lane 5, race N. I spot a few other sculls with the letter N and pull up beside them. This is a Novice race. We are all either first-time racers (like me), or at least, first time racing in a single. One of the other competitors looks like a weight lifter, a couple of the others look like Uni students. It’s comforting to see that most of them ook even more terrified than me.

Today the Regatta Centre is hosting over 100 races involving hundreds of athletes. There is a race starting every 5 minutes on a single 9 lane racetrack. Achieving this requires a remarkable logistical operation.

There’s a Race Official standing on a hill near the racing entry. She is waving rowers through, one at a time. Athletes who turn up early are asked to pull aside and wait, leaving room for latecomers to push through.

Once we are signalled through, we pass under a footbridge, where another race official, this time in a motor boat, checks us off on his iPad and directs us up the side of the racetrack. The next 3 races preparing in this area. So I row far enough back to line up well behind the athletes that are starting 5 minutes ahead of us (race M).

After lots of shuffling, I think I'm in the right lane. I'm N5. Ahead of me is M5. To my left is N6 and to my right, N4. I'm where I should be. I can breathe now. But there’s no time to relax. A third official in a motor boat putters up beside us and tells us to slowly move up towards the start line. I’m shaking from nerves.

The Race Official with the hardest job in the entire place is the guy who talks to us now over loudspeaker. This guy has less than 4 minutes to arrange 6 nervous rookies into a straight line at the starting line. On moving water. He executes this near impossible task with extraordinary skill and authority.

"4, 5 tap forward, 2,6 check, 6 check hard, 5 tap forward, 4 check, 5 check."

I stop trying to track where the start line is. I am simply a remote drone, awaiting the next instruction from my controller. When he finally stops talking, I look to my left. And see that we are all lined up perfectly along the starting line.

"Attention." beeeeeep. I'm racing. 

To explain what I'm thinking, and how I am feeling, at this moment. First I have to explain what I'm normally thinking about when I am training back home on Lake Illawarra.

When I'm training, my stream of consciousness might look something like this:

"Fast hands away, don't rush the slide, pivot at the hip, don't slouch, control the slide, chest proud, time the catch, check my Strokecoach, don't bury the oars deep, shoulders relaxed, loosey goosey, hands relaxed, engage the core, driiiive, spaghetti arms, fingers-not-wrists, control the slide".

I don't think all those thoughts on every stroke. Or even on every practice session. But I'm always consciously working on my body mechanics like this to try to improve my rowing efficiency.

Now, as I'm racing, all I can think is:

"I'm racing! I'm racing! OhMyGodOhMyGodOhMyGod!"

That is the entire contents of my brain at this moment.

I feel like I'm drugged. Squinting through a fog of adrenalin, searching for any semblance of rational thought.

So I reach for my security blanket. The Strokecoach. It’s an expensive GPS designed specifically for rowing. It tracks and records my every stroke. It displays my speed, stroke rate, and distance rowed.

I was a nerdy kid growing up. I didn't play much sport. And certainly nothing resembling athletics or racing. The language and concepts of racing are foreign and new to me. But the Strokecoach is something I understand. Numbers, Graphs. Science. This is my domain. This is my comfort zone. 

I have a race plan. A plan I've been practicing for months. Push hard for the first 250 metres, settle into a nice loping stroke for the middle 500m. Sprint again for the last 250m. It’s a comforting plan. A scientific plan. In Sports Science I trust.

 I look down at my Strokecoach to check my speed. And my stomach drops. Its stuck in a menu!

In all the frantic excitement of the start line, I left the Strokecoach sitting in menu mode. I forgot to start it! I can't see my speed, or stroke rate, or how much distance I've covered. All I can see is a menu, and the words:

"Start Workout? y/n"

I'm flying blind.

I haven't rowed without the Strokecoach for months. And I've never practiced for a race without it. 

In a panic, I consider how I might let go of an oar long enough to reset the Strokecoach. But that is madness. Like trying to fly a plane with only one wing. I have no choice but to fly blind the entire race. 

I've got no idea how far I've rowed. Or how far is left to row. The Strokecoach always tells me that!

Think. Think. Work brain, start working, I need you. OK OK. Someone told me there are distance markers on course. But where are they? What do they even look like? 

At this point, I should probably look around. But I CANNOT do it. I'm suffering from extreme, adrenalin fuelled tunnel-vision. All I can see is the lane markers behind me. Turning my gaze left or right feels like an impossible task. Row! Row! Row! Go! Go! Go!

My brain is on a Hamster Wheel. I can't look left or right. I can't consider my predicament. All my brain can do is scurry forward as fast as its tiny Hamster legs can carry it. It is thrilling and instinctive. It is in no way rational or considered.

The good news is that I'm keeping the boat straight, rowing straight down the middle of my lane. I normally row on a big open lake, no obstacles. I've never rowed with lane ropes before. The very small capacity my Hamster Brain has available is dedicated to keeping the oat straight.

The bad news is that I still have no idea how far I've rowed, or how far I have left to row. No distance. No time. No plan.

Again I consider looking around for signs. But for my one-track-mind, this seems impossible. I've got no idea what the distance markers look like. And even if I stared directly at one, I'm not sure my Hamster Brain would even be able to read it.

I check the Strokecoach again:

"Start Workout? y/n"

Now I hear a crowd. There’s a crowd near the finish line! That’s a clue! But the crowd sounds muted and distant. Does that mean the crowd is still a long way off? Or does my tunnel-vision also come with tunnel-hearing?

Through an act of sheer, heroic, willpower, I command my eyes to turn. I risk a quick glance to my left to look for the crowd. But all my addled brain registers is a blur. I’m not trying that again. Best to stick to what I know. Look down the lane and row row row!

Eventually I hear a horn. Heather has warned me: "When you hear the horn, don't stop rowing, because that horn could be for another competitor. You don't want to stop rowing and then realise that you've stopped short of the finish line." So I keep rowing. I hear a second horn. I keep rowing until I'm almost beached on the far bank.

Eventually I comprehend that the lane ropes have ended. I've gone past the finish line.

I've survived the race.

In fact, I think I enjoyed it. Can what I just endured truly be described as "fun"?

It turns out I placed 2nd. With a time of 4:05. I'm all alone in 2nd place. 1st place finished 17 seconds ahead of me. And I finished 22 seconds ahead of 3rd place.

Place                        1000M     Margins

1st  UTS                     3:48.43   0.00

2nd  SHELLHARBOUR CITY       4:05.26   16.83

3rd  BALMAIN                 4:26.80   38.37

4th  PENRITH                 4:27.09   38.66

5th  LEICHHARDT              4:31.99   43.56

6th  NEWINGTON               4:33.50   45.07

My "race plan" is in tatters. I rowed the entire race on muscle memory alone. 4:05 is not my personal best. But close enough to it. Given the lane ropes, the anxiety, and the adrenalin fog, I'm happy with a time close to my PB. All my practice has paid off. When I lost the plot and started rowing on instinct, my muscle memory saw me through.

The Bad

• I had no idea how much distance was left in the race, so I did not sprint at the end. I didn't "leave it all out on the field."
• I had secretly hoped to break the 4:00 minute barrier for the first time in this race. Oh well. 

The Good

• I rowed the entire race within my limits and under control. That usually results in efficient rowing and fast times. That’s how it played out today.
• Given this was my first attempt at racing, and my first time rowing in a lane, things might easily gone much worse. Rowing close to my PB is an achievement.

I don't have any time to waste. My next race is in 40 minutes time. I row under the footbridge, back to the warm-up lake, around the island and back to the jetty. My teammates are waiting there to congratulate me and help me with my boat. They watched the race and cheered me on at the finish line, then walked back across the island to meet me here at the jetty.

I'm happy with my race. Heather is happy that I'm happy. I'm happy that Heather is happy. Everybody is happy.

My memory is blurred here. I'm still drugged by a massive overdose of adrenalin. I'm thinking in a fog. Someone takes my oars, I get out of the boat. People are talking. Faces that I recognise. I walk somewhere. I'm glad Heather is here to lead me around because I can't think.

My teammates carry our double scull down to the water. I sit in the double. James sits in the double. Someone hands me my oars. Do I need to pee? I think I need to pee. I should have used the bathroom. There’s no time for that now. We push off on to the water, and I'm rowing again towards the starting area.

 Everything still feels distant and muted. That entire process of docking and switching boats reminded me of waking up in hospital after surgery. I don't understand what is going on. But I placidly accept everything that is happening, because nice people are talking in friendly voices. Heather is like an intensive-care nurse. Except instead of healing me, she straps me onto an unstable raft and pushes me into the deep. So less like a nurse and more like a Viking funeral priest.

The warm up row is good for me. The slow, rhythmic exercise brings my adrenalin back under control. My brain starts working again. Tony Brain, not Hamster Brain.

I'm sitting behind James. James and I started rowing together on Saturdays a couple of months ago. So I've spent hours on the water, staring at James's back. I'm more familiar with James's back than I am with his face.

James has the kind of torso that Lycra tank tops were designed for. He is a competitive swimmer. His back is impossibly wide. When he rolls his shoulders, muscles writhe and coil across his back. It’s a back that can blot out the sun. James is relaxed, sly humoured and charismatic. He is A Man in all the ways I very much am not. It’s impossible not to like him.

But James is also a teacher and an engineer. That’s much more in my comfort zone. It’s a bridge by which I can connect to James. So when Heather matched us up as a potential racing pair, I had something to talk about. James also seems genuinely impressed with my improving 1000m times in the single. This makes me very happy.

We pass under the foot bridge and line up for our race. This is a Masters (old people) event. There are 3 Men’s Masters Doubles races today. Our team mates, John and Howard, are lined up a couple of rows back, in the older age bracket race.

I am 44 years old, James is 33. That makes us one of the youngest crews in this race. So we have to give up a 7 second handicap (head start) to the oldest crews in our race. Theoretically, an “older rower” means a "weaker, slower rower". I'm sure that’s true at the elite level. But at my level of (in)experience, "older rower" often means “tough, wiry, glass-chewing bastards with decades of experience and ruthlessly efficient technique". It feels unfair to give those guys a head start.

The race official gets us lined up on starting line.

"Attention" beeeeeep

Two sculls (the oldest crews) take off. The race official starts counting.

1.

2.

3.

4.

On 4, two more sculls take off.

We are still sitting on the start line. 

It’s so quiet. The silence feels strange and endless.

5.

6.

7.

We explode into action, along with the other team who is also starting on 7. We are the two youngest crews, and last to launch.

This race feels totally different to my singles race. James and I need to move together, in sync. This race will be as much about how well we can co-ordinate our movements, as it is about individual skill or power. The mental work is also split between us. James is in the "stroke" seat, ahead of me. It is his job to set the rate and rhythm of our rowing. I'm in the "bow" seat behind James. My job is to steer the scull, and to try to match James's movements as he speeds up and slows down.

Our launch is bumpy. James, a veteran swimming competitor, anticipates the "7" and tries to time his launch as the race official says "7".  I am caught flat-footed. Waiting to hear the "7" before I act. The result is that James takes off before I do. I try to catch up and the scull lurches. But we've been practicing together for 2 months. So we have also practiced plenty of dodgy starts. We collect ourselves well, and by the 3rd stroke we've stabilised, and we are moving (roughly) together. Its ugly, but we have staved off disaster and made the best of it.

The big challenge for me in this race is the steering. This scull has a rudder. A rudder I can (theoretically) control with my foot. The trouble is that I've only steered a scull this way twice before (the last two practices before the regatta). I am not comfortable with the steering. I don't know where to put my foot to keep us heading straight ahead, and I'm not familiar with the delay between my turning the rudder and the boat turning.

The end result is that our scull weaves a snaky path down the track. I manage to avoid hitting the buoys on the side of our lane. But we weave back and forth for the entire race as I overcorrect left and right.

James has the Strokecoach. He calls out the change of pace at 250m. Then when we reach 750m James shouts. "Come on. Puuush" as we sprint for the finish.

More background: When I first started rowing, I was worried about falling in the water and losing my expensive prescription sun glasses. So I wear contacts when I'm rowing, and a cheap pair of plastic sunglasses that I bought for $20 at a roadside petrol station 15 years ago.

As we start sprinting, the arm of my sunglasses detaches, and my sunnies fall down crooked on my nose. It’s not a big deal. But I lose concentration for just a second, and next thing I know our oars are hitting the lane rope buoys. I steer us back toward the centre of the lane. James takes it in stride. Once again, I'm relieved to escape potential disaster so lightly.

James shouts "Dig deep". I'm pushing as hard as my tired legs will take me now. I am motivated by James's shouts, but I don't know how he still has the breath to talk. James tells me later that his shouts are carefully timed to when he has the oxygen.

We cross the finish line, far behind most of the other teams. But it felt like a good effort.

Place              Age  Handicap  1000M

1st  ST GEORGE     [D]  0         3:31.66

2nd  SHOALHAVEN 1  [C]  4         3:35.20

3rd  GLEBE 2       [B]  7         3:36.76

4th  MACQUARIE UNI [C]  4         3:46.47

5th  SHELLHARBOUR 2 [B]  7         3:58.73

6th  LEICHHARDT    [D]  0         4:23.65

So we rowed the 1000m in 3:52 (when you subtract our 7 second handicap). I don't have any experience with doubles rowing times, so I don't know how much faster we should be in a double. But neither James nor I can row under 4:00 in a single, so the it feels like a win to me.

The Bad

• We finished a long way behind the pack. The other scull with the same combined age/handicap as us finished 20 seconds faster. Even without the handicaps, the older crews would have beaten us in a straight up race.
• I was very wobbly with the steering.

The Good

• That would have been the first race of the day for most of those men, whereas I was racing again for the second time in 40 minutes. Not a bad effort.
• For me and James, it’s our first race as a pair. We didn't have any disasters, and we recovered well from some minor mishaps through the race.
• I'm still alive, with dignity intact.

After 2 races in 40 minutes, I now have 7 hours until I row again. The rest of the day falls into a steady routine.

Whoever is competing next, we carry their scull down to the water and send them off. We walk to the finish line to cheer them on, then return to the jetty to help them back out again

My Mum and Dad have travelled from Blackheath to support me. So along with Denise (my wife) and Suzanne (my Mother in-law), I probably have the largest fan club of any athlete here today. The heat is stifling, and there is no breeze in the grandstand. I'm impressed and grateful that my family chose to hang around for the full day. Denise has heard so many stories about Heather and the rest of the team, I enjoy the opportunity to introduce Denise to them.

Sometime around 2pm, the heady cocktail of adrenalin and endorphins that I've been riding all day wears off. At first it is a blessed relief. I'm finally able to think and talk normally, without a constant fog clouding my synapses. But very soon after, the exhaustion hits. My poor night’s sleep, all the exercise, the emotions, it all catches up to me, and I hit a brick wall. One minute I'm chatting, the next I'm poleaxed. I need to find a place to lie down.

Earlier in the day I found a shady spot in the athletes’ area with artificial grass. It’s a nice spot to stretch my hamstrings after a race. I zombie-stumble over there now. I lie down on the ground, set my phone alarm, and go to sleep.

This begs the question: Why was I was such a delicate sleeper last night? Now I can sleep like a dead man while lying on the hard ground, with crowds of teenagers stepping over my corpse and a loud speaker blaring constant rowing commentary into my ears. I’ve heard accounts of soldiers sleeping before combat. I thought that meant they were Stone Cold Badass. But maybe they were just Very ******* Tired.  

I wake up feeling much better.

My third and final race is at 5:00pm. A Men’s Quad Scull with James, John and Howard.

You've met John already, in my previous rowing Diary. He was a Taekwondo instructor before he started rowing. He is light, shorter than me, and has the kind of lean, flexible strength and coordination that I associate with life-long martial artists.

Howard is one of those tough old bastards I mentioned earlier. It feels good to have one on our team for a change. Howard has been rowing since he was young, it is in his bones.

John is some kind of manager/accountant at Wollongong University. He is smart and personable. I enjoy drawing John into long talks about body mechanics, rowing technique, and injury prevention. Howard works at the Steelworks. He has a blunt, straight-forward manner. Howards advice for injury prevention: "harden up". His opinion on training techniques: "less chatting, more rowing".

John and Howard are Tact and Straight-Talk. Finesse and Blunt-force. Scalpel and Hammer. They both represent something essential about rowing to me. They've been rowing together for years, and have an easy relaxed camaraderie, despite their opposing personalities.

As a crew, we have one small obstacle to overcome. We haven't trained together. At all. We've never all four of us sat in the same boat together. It’s difficult to find time to train for 3 or 4 different racing combinations. We also had issues with injuries. John and Howard are both incredibly fit for their ages, but they've both been injured in the lead up to this regatta.

It’s a big deal. The first row with a new crew is often a complete write-off, even in training. You need to spend time on the water to get comfortable with each other. The good news is that as John and Howard are experienced rowers and can adapt well on the fly. Also, John and Howard are doing the difficult jobs in the boat.

John is in the stroke seat. He sets the pace and rhythm. When rowing on his own, John is capable of rowing at a very high stroke-rate. But today he keeps the rating slower, so that James and I can keep up. As the tallest member of the crew, I would normally be in the stroke seat if we were an experienced crew. But John and Howard have decades of racing experience, so John sits in stroke, setting the pace, while Howard sits in bow, steering the scull.

James and I have the easy job. We are in the middle 2 seats. We don't have to set the pace, or steer. We are just muscle. That’s the first and only time you'll hear me described that way.

We try our best to "practice" on the way to the starting line. We stop once and try a race start. Our race training completed, we now head for the race area.

The Masters Doubles race I rowed with James had 3 races over 3 age divisions. This Masters Quad race has only a single race with crews of all ages. So even though the average age of our crew has gone up, we are conceding an even bigger head start to most of our competition.

We are giving up a 15 second handicap. No doubt to a crew of supernaturally strong, hundred-year-old vampires. (Please ignore the hypocrisy when my motley crew of injury-ridden old codgers gets beaten by a crew of invincible 25-year-old Olympians doped up on their own hormones).

Waiting at the start line for 15 seconds feels like an eternity. I wonder if those first crews might finish the race before we're even allowed to launch. On 15, they unleash the hounds, and we surge in chase of our prey.

I must be getting more comfortable with racing already. Because I now have enough excess brain capacity to look around. I see gigantic signs telling me how far we've rowed. Signs the size of a car, with huge, clear numerals. It seems impossible that I didn't see them in my first race.

With hindsight, I understand the source of my problem. I went into that first race with a plan. And when something went wrong with my plan, my adrenalin-soaked brain could not adapt. Now that I've raced a couple of times I feel better able to roll with the punches.

I've never rowed at "race speed" in a quad before. We are really flying across the water. It’s thrilling stuff. The youngest team in the race, Glebe, gave up a 22 second handicap. And they come surging past us at an extraordinary pace.

We manage to catch and overtake 3 of the older teams before they reach the finish line. Putting us in 4th place. We are all very pleased with ourselves, given that we never practiced together. It’s a great way to finish off the day.

Place                   Age Handicap  1000M         Margins

1st  GLEBE              [B]  22        3:29.65      

2nd  SYDNEY WOMENS MLC 1 [F]  6         3:32.59       2.94

3rd  GLEBE/SWAN RIVER   [G]  0         3:33.81       4.16

4th  SHELLHARBOUR CITY  [D]  15        3:49.84       20.19

5th  DRUMMOYNE          [E]  11        3:50.64       20.99

6th  SYDNEY WOMENS MLC 2 [G]  0         4:03.37       33.72

7th  NORTH SHORE        [F]  6         4:24.14       54.49

 We ended up completing the race in 3:35, once you subtract our handicap. Given that I've never knowingly covered 1000m in less than 4:00 minutes, that seems blindingly fast. But the winning team did it in 3:07. So clearly quad racing is a whole new world that I can look forward to.

We catch our breath, and then row back to the jetty, where our team has started to disassemble and load the boats back onto the trailer for the trip home. I try taking a rigger off our quad. I give the rig a one-handed, open-palm jab. It comes away smoothly in my hand. Oh yeah. I'm a rower now.

Day after the regatta. I’m completely wiped out. My legs are jelly. Denise catches me “doing the dishes” and takes a photo:

I’m completely exhausted. But I can’t resist checking the weather prediction for tomorrow. Low wind. Good rowing conditions…

Its Tuesday. 3 days after the regatta. My first day back on the water, for an early row before work. Heather, John, Howard, and Linda are all there, practicing their Masters Mixed Quad Scull.

At first, it’s a relief to go rowing with my full faculties intact. I can row and think at the same time! But halfway across the lake, I start to notice that rowing is a lot more uncomfortable than I remember it. I’m out of breath. It’s hot. Everything is sore. This isn’t how I felt on Regatta Day, no matter how exhausted I was. When did rowing become so hard? 

I come to a stop.

I move up into starting position.

"Attention" beeeeeep

1.

2.

3.

4.

5.

6.

7.

Boom. I’m racing. And I feel great.

Written by Tony Martin