by Melissa Bray
“You can’t say what country they’re
from, but you can say who their
coach is.”
South Africa’s head coach Christian
Felkel is one of many coaches to affirm
this sentiment on the current state of
rowing styles in the world. “The style
influence is totally from the coach, not
the country,” says Felkel who first
learned to row and coach in Germany.
This trend is the result of coaching
becoming increasingly international in
recent years as coaches move away from
their home country to take coaching jobs
in other countries around the world.
One of the best known of the United States
coaches is Kris Korzeniowski. Originally
from Poland, Korzeniowski has coached in
Canada, Italy, China and the Netherlands
before returning to the United States in
2001. He is now the head sculling coach.
“You can tell who the rower is coached
by,” says Korzeniowski echoing Felkel’s
words. “The style is influenced by the
coach, not the country.”
Korzeniowski says that although he has
had to adapt his coaching style in terms
of his approach to athletes, technically
he has retained the same ways when he
has moved countries.
“The bodywork is the only difference,”
says Korzeniowski in terms of styles
throughout the world. “Some rowers
have more layback, some lift the body,
some drive more on the legs, some have
fast hands out, some slow. It all comes
with the coach and how they believe we
should move the boat.”
For FISA’s 2001 Coaches Conference,
Korzeniowski presented a paper that
divided coaching styles into three major
schools of training:
1. The traditional East-German school
exemplified by a lot of mileage and
less intensity work.
2. The mixed school created by Thor
Nilsen which works at developing
every physiological characteristic and
favouring a medium amount of
volume.
3. The power school which is
exemplified by high intensity with
most training done in a competitive
environment, like rowers being put
side-by-side or in a time trial situation.
“In my opinion every school has had a
big share of success,” says
Korzeniowski, noting that at the finish
line of international races boats are so
close that it is difficult to pinpoint what
is the decisive factor in winning.
Korzeniowski says his best coaching
education came when he worked in Italy
in the 1980s under Italy’s then Technical
Director Thor Nilsen. Nilsen, the
ultimate international coach, can list
athletes from around the globe amongst
those he has coached. “I coach athletes,
not countries,” says Nilsen who notes
that rowing styles throughout the world
have become more uniform in recent
years.
© US Ro wing
Igor Grinko
In the lead up to the 2008 Beijing
Olympics, China has brought in a new
head coach - Igor Grinko. Starting off
under the Soviet system as a national
team rower before becoming a coach,
Grinko then went to the United States
where he stayed until 2004. Although
Grinko says he has stuck with the
coaching methods he developed while in
the former Soviet Union, he observes
that the rowing environments have been
very different.
© US Rowing
Kris Korzonowski
“In China the athletes are recruited at a
young age. They are taken away and get
free food, free accommodation and are
guaranteed a job. Some don’t know why
they’re recruited, they just get told to go.
This is a different system from the US,”
says Grinko who had to learn to coach
athletes that were there by their own free
will and completely self-funded. The
Chinese system very much reminds him
of rowing in the ex-USSR.
Meanwhile in the road to the next
Olympics, coaches have again been on
the move around the world as National
Federations update their four-year plan.
Included in the moves is Italian Gianni
Postiglione leaving Spain to join the
Greek team while Germany’s Harald
Jahrling has moved from Australia to
head Ireland’s rowing programme. Dutch
coach René Mijnders joins the Swiss
national team and Chris Nilsson leaves
the United States team to return to coach
in his home country New Zealand. On
another stage, New Zealander Duncan
Holland has moved from The
Netherlands to become head coach at
Cambridge University.
Although Felkel sees variations
throughout the world he notes that all the
top crews have one thing in common -
they keep the boat running. “At the end
of the day the way a rowing boat moves
hasn’t changed in a thousand years.”
