The Rowing Chat channel on YouTube features lots of great rowing insights and discussions and a relatively recent episode, “Rowing Gadgets & Gear #2 – Para Rowing & More”, focused entirely on the para side of the sport. Hosted by Charlotte Pierce, she spoke with guest Ellen Minzer, director of Outreach for Community Rowing Inc. (CRI) in Brighton, Massachusetts.
The entire post is worth sitting down for with a cuppa, but here are a few of my favorite excerpts…
- Sweet Cheeks 200” – A way to personalize padding especially for helping fixed seat.
- “A great race is a great race. Everyone loves to see that bow ball right next to another lane right down to the wire.” – Evoked the spirit of the UK “Time Handicapping” innovation.
- Using standard hulls for PR1 and PR2 – Making the sport more accessible because less specialized equipment would be needed and easier to row
- “Making that kind of experience for more people just real comes from talking with the athlete and find out what they need. In pararowing, there is no cookie cutter for anybody. So, how do we advance this? We have to allow things to be much more customizable. We have to have people like Andy [Crumpholt] to can provide some engineering and know-how in order to create those things that are really going to work for the athlete…[figuring out all of the custom requirements] is both maddening and exciting because its like a new Rubic’s cube everyday.”
- “The person who commented that the [remote steering device] may not be safe or might add an element of danger…that person isn’t wrong. All of the things that we are doing right now, you are going to have to consider to be a calculate risk. But athletes who are pushing the envelope,
Thanks for writing this – really appreciate the support.
Very cool – thank you for mentioning our podcast! Tomorrow 5/1/2019, we’re having Tara Morgan of the Seize the Oar on for a chat about inclusive rowing and the joys of rowing in the Pacific NW!