3/9/2005: Rowing on ice

Pastoral today. The official caption: Head of the Charles rowing regatta Executive Director Fred Schoch (Front) and Assistant Director Chris Kerber (Rear) row through the ice on Boston's Charles River near the Harvard University Boathouse, March 1, 2005. The two men decided to go for a row in defiance of the continued wintry conditions in the Northeast of the United States in the month of March and to get ready for their regatta early this year.

just replying because i dont want to see an iotd go down in flames. but.....this is a bit boring.

Then there ARE actually people out there as stubborn and bullheaded as yours truly.

People have sent in better ones too I need an IotD breather since I've been doing it for so long. I want to build a submission/nomination device that will autopost to the thread, but it's hard.

Considering the winter Boston has had it's not surprising they're getting a little stir crazy. From the spacing of the oar marks I'd say they're making pretty good speed. Taking the same route back doesn't hurt either.

Long ago I was a crew Jock.

Great picture!

Typically the ice on the Charles breaks up in mid March, just in time for MITs spring break, when the crew team starts doing twice a day practices. Until then it's weights, rowing in the tank, and running up the Green Building.

The first race is on April 2.

Dartmouth has it much worse. They usually only get a week between ice-out and the first race. Needless to say their record tend to improve as the season goes on.

Dartmouth needs an Endless Pool to train in.

Maybe a pic thread feeder with a limited thread life? General acclamation to move a pic over to the p-o-t day er... iod thread? You do so well with it though and its one of the real hooks here, do you really want to hand the keys over? It might get sucky...

Make Lumberdave do it!

I was under the impression you were overflowing with images... I come across interesting things often but think, "Nah, I bet someone's already sent it to him." Maybe if people just made an effort to send you more, it wouldn't be too much work?

The hardest part is the posting - if I just wrote the autopost part it would be a lot easier. Enh, I'll work on it. IotD must go on and improve!

I agree and disagree with lumberjim. The picture is boring in terms of composition. The subject however, rowing through ice is intriguing, like riding a bike on ice, because you can. I totally disagree with lumberjim that IotD is going down. I think UT does a great job, day in, day out (that is hard work) with subjects that are always mind twisting. kudos UT.

Tanks for the endless pool

Any decent college crew already has a rowing tank that's kind of like the endless pool. There are some good pictures here: http://www.durhamboat.com/TANK.HTM

The problem is that rowing in the tank only gets you so far. It's like training for a marathon on the stairmaster. It's better than nothing, but it's not the real thing.

The hard part about rowing (besides the blisters on your palms, gasping for breath, and those times when both legs fall asleep and you have to stumble around on the dock in your socks through the goose turds) is balance.

The boats balance OK if all the rowers put the oars in the water. It's when they lift oars up that the boat can flop to the left or right. If the ports each raise their blades a little, and the starboards all lower a little, then the shell is going to lean over to the left. It's kind of like balancing on a tightrope with a balance pole, except that four people are hold the left pointing half of the pole, and four are holding the right half.

Thanks Hampor, that's pretty cool. I didn't know that kind of thing existed.
Do those boats (shells, skulls) have any kind of keel? I know some canoes do and some don't.

Can we get more pics from Spain? There was a run of Spanish IotD--the running of the bulls, the great tomato-fight, the naked bicyclists...let's go back to Spain!!
...Or, Mexico!!

This picture was very intriguing for me but I am from the west where we don't do a lot of this kind of thing. I have enjoyed learning more about it from all of your posts.

Undertoad, I am sorry you are feeling burnt out. I love checking the image of the day. I have often seen the picture already but your narrative adds a special point of view.

Let me know where I can send potential IoTDs. If I have any comments I will add those. Maybe they will spark something for you.

Sandra

if only they were skating. and it was thin ice.

Guess it's true...

What? Southwest? West Arizona?

even keel

I don't know about skulls, but for crew shells there is sometimes just a little bit of a keel at the tail, and then the rudder. For most of the length it's sort of a semicircle. Here's a picture of a cross (very cross) section. http://www.jrshells.com/pages/jrs_vespoli_repair.html

What I found intriguing is the risk that they took. The ice could have esily drifted closed and then they would have to walk home.

I almost submitted this exact picture a few days back, but decided that it was probably too bland for most people. I, however, thought it was pretty damn cool.

Forward as attachment to undertoad@cellar.org

Don't be put off if I don't use it

Thanks in advance!

you know you should put a frigging huge link saying that somewhere.

You're right... actually I should just get the submission thingie done and be done with it.

I'd turn something out for you but I still haven't had time to get the kinks out of the map app.